I spent a lot of time at the mall growing up. My mom and her best friend hauling their combined total of six children through the shops. Play breaks in the wide open space near the fountains. Hopes of a few bucks to ball out at the dollar store, maybe an Orange Julius.
As a pre-teen, the mall was a place to go wander for hours — with or without money. Back before you were required to be with an adult if you were under the age of 18. Parents never asked us why we would want to go or what we would do, loitering in A/C was an accepted American pastime.
By the time I hit high school, the mall was still an It Girl job. I’d stand at the front of The Buckle, the waist of my jeans skimming across my hipbones, folding Ecko hoodies in on themselves, smiling big at the boys in from Ft. Knox with money to burn, “You want a puka shell necklace with those Docs and Lucky Jeans?” We worked on commission. Layaway was still a thing. Christmas gift wrapping with the crisp corners, discounts in the mall food court.
Now, the mall is a place where I go to do my returns. And I hardly do much else while there. I have no desire to linger. Long gone are my 5-7-9 days and rummaging through the offerings for what might fit but most likely will not all under a spray of harsh lighting is not how I want to spend my time. Foot traffic is low enough that the pretzels are cold, the flavor hyper-processed.
I’m no historian, but as I recall it, during The Great Recession, folks were too poor to shop and stores weren’t making enough money to afford their leases. Mall traffic never really rebounded. There was also the move to police children while there, mobs of them being disruptive or something, and carceral vibes don’t really put folks in a shopping mood (see Walgreens learning that if you put all your goods behind locked plexiglass cases people will stop shopping with you rather than waiting around for an employee to unlock a stick of deodorant).
The majority of our shopping moved online and social media greedily grabbed up a slice of that pie. But through mass exodus and platform collapse, I believe we are seeing the earliest stages of social media platforms following the same trajectory of the American mall.
Facebook is place I go to share updates and occasionally skim. But it’s no longer the hub for social connection that it was for me even just a few years ago. I rarely accept or send new friend requests over there anymore. And Zuck continues to make changes to make it even more inhospitable. Musk finally moved me, and many of the other people that brought the magic to the platform, to delete my Twitter account. I’m too old to get into creating content for TikTok. Instagram remains my last bastion but as my feed increasingly becomes more ads, I find myself making efforts to drastically cut my time back over there (I got a Brick and suddenly had the time to read 7 books this month!).
I don’t know where we gather after this, but I don’t think any social media platform will ever again take up as much real estate in my life. Just like how malls still exist, but now only serve as a place of transaction. I’ve joined reading groups at the library, dabbling in organizations to join and retreating into my writing community for social connection. I’m sure my aging eyes will appreciate the decrease in screen time.
P.S. Sorry this is a day late, I’m traveling this week.