Disarmed

I try to avoid the malls like the plague. Although I once walked briskly through their halls as a teenager, fantasizing about being able to purchase everything I wanted, I now find them hauntingly soul-less, unnatural and depressing. Their vastness, the piped in air and the focus on consuming innumerable products left me feeling hollow when I left. Knowing that I have an unpopular opinion of malls, I feel like a traitor to myself and my children any time I wheel them around these consumer meccas. My oldest wants to go to the malls all the time now and it truly makes me sick.

Why do I go? Free entertainment pure and simple. Since our house is on the market, it is one place we can quickly go where the children can be entertained safely, comfortably and free. Meanwhile, I try to internalize all my negative feelings and simply enjoy the fun my kids are having.

The last time we were at a mall, I was wheeling the boys around, killing time and I made the controversial (to myself and my husband who wasn't present but in my head) decision to go into the Disney store. Stacked from floor to ceiling and busting off their shelves and into the aisles were endless products and must-haves for children of all ages. As a kid, I'm sure the place was magical and amazing. To me, it was nauseating. Obviously, there is nothing evil about the products they were selling but the people behind the products, the big daddy executives and the marketing whores were whose stench I couldn't remove from my nose as I wheeled through the aisles.

There were so many products stuffed into the space that I began to find it difficult to wheel our double stroller through the aisles. With effort I managed to wind my way to the back of the store only to find myself stuck, trapped in Disney hell with three children eyeing everything with awe. It was time to go but I simply couldn't. Down one aisle stood a woman oblivious to my needs and down the other was a salesperson coming our way to discuss my babies, the stroller and how she could possibly help us purchase some product. I decided that I had to go toward the salesperson because the other woman was intent on examining all the varied goodies on her aisle.

I talked with the salesperson politely as I pushed the stroller toward her. At the tightest spot in the aisle, I found myself next to a mannequin sporting some merchandise that someone was going to have to have. Blushing with effort and gagging from my distaste of the store, I tried to be as polite as I could as the saleswoman began handing the boys cards for Narnia - just what they needed: free advertisements just for us. As all my feelings of annoyance and claustrophobia set in I inadvertently knocked the arm off the mannequin. Oops.

Making the joke that the aisles weren't designed for my ridiculously large brood, I apologized to the saleslady who was relatively understanding about it. I managed to free the stroller from the narrow passage and fled quickly from the store. Once I had relaxed and felt a safe distance away from the confines of the Disney store, I couldn't help but laugh at my unintended destruction of the mannequin. Obviously, what I did was relatively minor but I contented myself by pretending that I'd just stuck it to the man.