Word: malling
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...visit home is ever complete without the requisite shopping trip at the local mall. Last week’s Thanksgiving visit felt like a time warp to the end of the summer, which was marked by a particularly memorable shopping experience. I had just returned from two and a half months in Jerusalem, but I can honestly say that going to Westfield Shoppingtown Montgomery was one of the most interesting parts of my summer...
...appetite for anything. I think there’s something about the abundance of material goods that drives us either way: desire or repulsion. As mom and Savta floated in the former category, I was bouncing around in the latter. We headed towards the open part of the mall and I made eye contact with a hardheaded four-year-old whose mascara’d mother was stuffing his arms into a corduroy jacket. All it took was my empathetic gaze to finally break him down into a teary tantrum...
What exactly is it about the mall that brings these intense emotions out of us? I don’t know about my young golden-curled friend, but I generally enjoy shopping. The overweight penalty I paid in the Tel Aviv airport is testament to the decidedly materialistic way in which I experience place. So while some people return from vacation with postcards and souvenirs, I come back with a suitcase stuffed with shirts, bags and shoes...
...different place, and of the ways in which my daily American life is distinctive. One of those ways, of course, is the difference between casually sniffing a shirt picked up at a colorful outdoor market, and examining myself from all angles in a three-way mirror at the mall...
Part of what I find overwhelming at the mall is how utterly blatant American consumerism is. The mall doesn’t even pretend it is about necessity items. And maybe we should be grateful for that: Your local mall (that is probably now owned and renamed by a giant corporation) is very upfront about its mission. It exists to glorify consumerism—and to include you in that project. So while I wove in and out of oncoming foot traffic making mental lists of what I “refuse...