Lets Go To The Mall Today!

The Galleria

This was an email rant from 2002 about Mall shopping in Dallas.

Last Sunday one of the top ten most horrific things that can happen to
me came to pass - I had worn through a pair of jeans and needed a new
pair. I admit, this doesn't hold the terror of, say, my car breaking
down, my mother needed my kidney, or even the government calling on me
to wipe out the invading alien scum. However, needing new clothes means
that I have to suck it in and go to the mall. In all honesty, if it came
to facing alien scum or going to the mall, I would much rather face the
alien scum - I mean, at least then I get to blow stuff up.

I think my fear of the mall comes from the fact that I'm the one guy
there who isn't thrilled to be there. Every one else is so happy lining
up at Starbucks and looking for a sale at Macys, as if the entire week
the mall beckoned them to come home. I on the other hand walk around
going "can't afford this, can't afford that...", as if I had an
accountant for a guardian angel.  I suspect the shops have recently
changed their advertising philosophy to combat this world view known as
"living in reality". It used to be that there would be pictures of
attractive people wearing the clothes being sold, letting us know that
attractive people look great in these clothes, but that's OK, because we
never will. This is the truth, but it doesn't convince us consumers who
don't open the wallet like me. Well, stores got wise and switched to a
reverse psychology scheme - now, they show attractive people wearing...
well, nothing.  This makes us think "I will never look that good, so I
better buy some clothes to cover my beer gut and fat ass." It doesn't really
work on me though, as I just think that it's a better reason to get a
copy of Photoshop.

Walking around, I was thrilled to realize that, as a guy, I don't have
to face the numerous fashion decisions of the opposite sex. No, luckily
mens fashion can be easily broken into a small number of subcategories.

Postmodern. With hip glasses and stylish slacks, the purpose of the
postmodern look is to be able to legitimately say phrases like "You
haven't gone to the new Picasso exhibit at the museum of art?" or "I
know a place that serves the best espresso mocha latte".  I tried some
of the clothes, but it violated my number one rule of shopping for
clothes - don't buy anything that makes you look stupid.

Fraternity Brother. Apparently the latest trend in Fraternity brother
clothing is the "ultra wrinkled shorts". Personally, I have never seen
shorts so wrinkled, and I haven't used my iron since the "Grilled
Cheese" incident back in college. It made me wonder what the poor
Indonesian children had to do get them so wrinkled in the first place.
It also made me wonder if soon we would see somebody selling high
fashion wrinkling agent for laundry. In all honesty, I applaud the
wrinkled look, as I've been party to it since leaving for college years
ago.

Golf Pro. This look allows you to appear like every other guy at the
country club. The only things I could afford were pants that looked like
they were rejected by my grandfather, and if you know grandpa, that
isn't high praise.

Sports Jock. By wearing lots of baggy over sized clothes with swooshes on
it, you can tell other people "I think about putting my gym membership
to good use in the near future." Also known as the "I canít fit into
anything without an elastic waistband" look. The other end of the Jock
look is the all spandex look, which violates my corollary to the first
rule of shopping for clothes - everyone looks stupid in spandex.

Not being able to afford clothes. This has been around in various forms
though out the ages, this is also known as "I'm to cool to shop at
Goodwill." The latest trend is to buy your jeans pre-destroyed, having
had them torn and restitched, but fashionably. Once again, I wondered
what the poor Indonesian children had to make these clothes: sew, rip,
stitch?.  The worst part was having my accountant guardian angel keep
reminding me that I can't afford the destroyed jeans. Yes, my life is
that pathetic - I can't even afford to look like I can't afford clothes.

Well, I tried - I browsed, I peeked, I fought off effeminate sales
people, and in the end, I ran away screaming and went to the mega-mart
for my pair of jeans. Clothes from the mega-mart only weakness is that
the only last a month and a half, as they were made by low-rent
Indonesian children. Which of course means, soon I will face apparel
hell yet again.

Aliens, take me away.

I’m surprised at the vitriol I had in my youth, but you have to understand where I was coming from. It wasn’t that I never went to the mall. The only things to do in Dallas were eat and shop. One time a friend from high school came to visit me, and after I asked my entire team where to take her the two answers I got were the Galleria (a mall) and the Sixth Floor Museum (where Kennedy was shot).

What was painful about going to the mall was it was full of the happy pretty people.  Coming from post-generation X and five and a half years in a film program, I’d come to resent rampant commercialism and it’s crushing effects on individualism, or at least I was told I did. I now lived in North Dallas whose population was filled with $30K a year millionaires; people who had gotten their first job and used their new income to buy a BMW and lots of pretty clothing. I’d walk around the mall watching all the pretty people, who looked like the people in the catalogs, and I was both gloating and envious. Gloating because they so easily became sheep to consumer culture, buying what they were told and living an unattainable dream. Envious because I was never going to to have that girlfriend with whom I could share a cookie at the Nestle Tollhouse, or could get matching Diesel watches, or shop for movies with at the F.Y.E. I wanted to be straight so much.