When we visit, my parents take my kid to play in the indoor playground at my childhood mall. I never come along. They’ve told me there’s almost nothing left in there. I’ve told myself I don’t want to come along because fuck capitalism and all that, but I think part of it is that I’m a little afraid to see what’s become of a place that was so nostalgic to me. I mean, it’s not like if Spencer’s is still there, the world is better off… but yeah, a whole lot of nostalgia.

We don’t have a mall where I live, and I keep wondering when my kid gets older where she’ll hang out when it’s too cold out to be outside for long. There’s nowhere here besides houses and the library to hang out for hours. For me, the mall was a place where I could feel free and silly and anything could happen. But I also bought a lot of crap I didn’t need.