Let The Economic Good Times Roll

Went to the mall today for a bit of contemporary clothing in response to my recent new venture into the singles scene, not too many parking spaces today, I try to avoid the weekend crowd of mall shoppers so I am not use to the large influx of humanity with 9 to 5, Mon-Fri jobs who need something to do on the weekends, so if not the movies, then why not pass some time wandering the economic shopping trial to Oz. Seems busier than normal especially considering when I do hit the mall, it tends to be on the weekdays where there are nothing more than some elderly walking the aisles for excerise, social means, or for just a convenient place to linger while waiting for the cold hand of death to deliver the final blow.

The economy is offically recovered according to those up to the minute cable news network channels who know such things that those with crystal balls and Harvard MBA's cannot seem to dissect from various financial investment institutions who have the reputation of seeing into the future like the Oracles of Delphi and see where those visions got various characters of Classic Greek Literature, today offers up a great example of mainly working class families from various ethnic backgrounds, wait, that tag sucks, let's just say a new generation of people and youth who are driving the sales registers in this new reformulated consumer block of the 21st century, it is no longer the Anglo middle class families gathering all together for some binge shopping at the local outlet to buy all the lastest cool hip things they see on television, the old joneses mentality, if they have it, so must I, and there folks you have the birth of the American consumer who has driven the global economy for many decades since post WWII, there seems to be a sense of entitlement amongst our society that we have the right to go out and buy whatever we want, does not just have to be clothing, cars, and dinner, but other more off the grid objects, like drugs, sex, and human beings, a dark pure crystalized energy has twisted its way into the DNA of our society, I contain the virus as well, having no problem spending 8 dollars on a beer at a nightclub and other things that shall remain off the grid, this sense of money having any real definition, any sort of long term existence, as if fuck it, at this rate the world might not be around in 20 years, so why not just blow it up and go for broke, I want it and I want it now, this culture of instant gratification is why this shopping mall is here in the first place.

I remember when it use to be just Sears, JC Penny, and for the higher up types Macy's and Bloomingdale's, now there is Target, Wal Mart, Best Buy, Kohl, RC Willey, Home Depot and those are only the big name stores, there are plenty of speciality shops for bathing products, make up, sporting goods, shoes, lifestyle stores that have clothing, furniture, and home design, an overwhelming glut of places to spend money that is without even getting into dining and the internet, could go off on other complete tangets with those two examples, but hopefully the point has been made that we are surrounded like the settlers in covered wagons by the invading army of enemies who are looking to extract every single dollar from us as possible with many angles but the number one angle of course is about being cool. more on that later.

As I walk throughout the mall there is a center section reserved for those kiosks with all sorts of products from places that you have never heard of and companies you would not find in the magazine of Fortune, manned by a legion of slick con artist sales people who remind of the tourist touts from any country I have been to throughout my travels globally, like a starving buzzard with mad cow disease slowly circling the mall attempting to pull would be customers in who tend to be passive making them the perfect prey for these former tourist touts who will have them buying sets of Syrian windchimes, handmade by Bedoiun artists in most remote regions of Syria or there are the perfume and skin lotions from the shores of Southern Crete that have these regenerative properties of youth not seen since the days of Ponce DeLeon and the fountain of youth, the secert formula of Cleopatra herself found from ancient scrolls hidden for thousands of years in some distant cave, nothing but snake oil salesmen in the middle row of any shopping mall, how they stay in business remains a mystery to me, but their con skills tend to have a tractor beam effect that gets many shoppers as well as tourists here in this particular Las Vegas mall all to willing to part with their money.

So now onto some black on black consumerism, the new angle for masses, first it was the barbershop, they make a movie, tie in some cultural relevance to it, missing the old school black panther down with whitey piece of the puzzle where everyone in the hood use to roll out to the neighborhood barbershop to get their haircut or a shave, then sit around and talk shit about everyone else in the hood, I guess that is how it went, or what they are trying to sell, who in the hood has fifty bucks nowadays to get a shave or haircut, I got mine cut at home, didn't have no money for sitting in some barber chair acting like Eddie Murphy with wit humor and actor cool, so without delving into the blackness of the barbershop itself, I stop by a kiosk, checking out this new cultural get your shoes polished con put on buy some slick brothers in creased blue jeans and white T-shirts start who breaking it down for these urban hipsters brothers wearing patent white leather sneakers that probably cost a couple hundred dollars, crooked bill baseball caps, baggy cuffed blue jeans, and big colorful leather looking jackets, straight up music video type stuff, which hey if that's what the kids are down for today, it's all on them, all the wasted time and money in that eternal quest to get laid, have to break it down to the lowest level, why do most guys and girls let's be fair here, go out and spend three hundred dollars on a pair of pants or five hundred dollars on a pair of heels, is to so show that they either have game or want someone who has game that can afford to live a high fashion lifestyle which has so readily spread upon the global internet and airwaves like a terminal disease with a 100 percent mortality rate, so now we have some brothers, working up some other brothers on why they need their kicks (sneakers) polished by someone else and be overcharged for the experience on top that, the experience to watch young women walking by at the mall in tight skirts who might get excited at the fact that two young brothers can throw down 30 bucks to get their shoes shined by these homeboys who could be either be working for Microsoft or the Dopeman, the shoe shine brothers have just brought a once considered perfectly normal part of let us say 50's american culture back to the future, will it work, just depends what kind of mental head trip they lay down on these potential customers, you know shit like, oh we have this special white shoe polish cultivated from deepest mountains of the Andes, brought here to the states by drug mule, smuggled in by trained cartel coyotes who move stealth like the ninja in the night so that YOU, may have the opportunity, no the priviledge of keeping your kicks extra super soft and clean, I mean man this shit has telfon in it, damn dirt just bounces of you shoes like bullets off a vest, can u dig it?

I guess they could, dig it, cause, not more than a minute later those brothers were over there snappin and poppin their polishing towels adding the extra bit of flair and conversation to keep these customers from figuring out that they were being got over on in a public place, quite possibly in front of their friends and potential hot women who might be thinking the same thing I thought when they passed by, who the fuck gets their tennis shoes shined?

Another interesting thing is the consumer trap laid upon these people shopping here right now. This mall is one of those run of the mill 80's type of malls that have all the classic amenties found in suburban malls of yesteryear, Hot Dog on a Stick, Sears, Orange Julius, Hot Topic, Journies, Foot Locker, and the infamous food court of knock off fast food big names serving up the lowest quality of Hepitits B and malaria found in the western world, not going to find any Chanel, Burberry, or Vera Wang here, no high end runway models here with grey haired men in wrap around shades, smiling that smile of a man who enjoys 25 year old hot russian pussy who wouldn't want that gig, somebody has to do it, can't take the money with you.

Mall now abuzz with families camoflauged by throngs of shopping bags ranging from Macy's to Victoria's Secret, Sports Authority to Vitamin World, but where does this cycle lead, the repetition of trashing the old and purchasing the new, a never ending cycle, complete with a job, that is a minimum requirement in order to take part in the shopping spree escapade, does not have to be a legit job, pimps, players, drug dealers, gamblers, and con artists , need clothing too, throw in a few kids to make a family and the spending equation expands exponentially. This is nothing but financial lockdown of a socio-cultural economic prison camp that has become nothing more than car payments, high interest credit cards and the tightrope of living week to week with no savings, no health insurance, and more than likely renting a place to live in. Still the crowd here is not too concerned or deterred by that haunting reaper, like a spector hiding in the shadows biding his time by sharping his long blades for the day when it all falls apart, job loss, relationship break up, a knocked up piece of ass, DUI, manslaughter, violence of all sorts, caught between destitution and the court system with no real legal representation, so melt those thoughts away with the purchase of rockabilly T-shirts, tattoos, and endorsed basketball sneakers, then rejoice.

These people are a neverending gold mine where by just making something hip, cool, and unique teens, 20 somethings, 30's, 40's 50's and 60 year olds want to get a piece of the action, pull the hot girl in the tight fitting mini skirt with ass, body, and eyes to make every other guy in a mile radius want to either, gasp, fight, or freeze up in amazement, same goes with the ladies, who want to see men go through the same rituals they have been putting women through since the beginning of civilization, just one walk through this mall, the colonge, tight boxer briefs, the massive array of dress clothing, designer jeans, sports coats, gel hair products, watches,and patent leather boots, collide with going to the gym, and starvation. Twisting a young generation of guys into the same nuerotic self image conscious women they are trying to meet, no wonder everyone is so stand offish today, communicate through non face to face means, you know all already, so no need to Twitter or Facebook me about it, cause I don't use them.

This ritual of social interaction drives the clothing market, fashion is seasonal and varies from year to year, recycling over the decades, all you have to do is buy in on the trends, go see what the economically poor designer minded teens of America are weaving together from the thrift shops, dumpsters and a sewing machine, then check MTV and pretty soon Target, Sears, and Wal Mart have now become the final stop in the long chain hip urban clothing, even the poor shall inherit fresh gear to wear to school in hopes of avioding ridicule, social outcast, and desire that sometimes follows in one day opening fire on the entire senior class. With the help of China and their highly effective means of getting laborers to work for less than a dollar a day, anyone in the states can afford styles that only 30 years ago were actually handmade in Europe and are now mass produced at the cost of a mass atrocity amongst millions of Chinese workers who are nothing but faceless robots performing tasks that even technological machines refuse to do, walking inside their personal metropolis of lever pulling, folding, cleansing, and then heading home to live a 8x8 cubicle, put on some tea and wonder where the streets of gold might be located that were so dutifully promised in rural lands of China.

Now everyone can be a star who does not want to experience those kinds of emotions, without those dreamers in us all, there would not be any rock music, hip hop, movies or tv shows, no Paris fashion weeks or E entertainment channel but which idea drives the other, I think there has always been a market for fame, going back to the Pharohs, the Greeks, long before mass produced ceramic bowls and togas. but for every cool excepted rocker, there is some free thinker unattached to all the socially accepted amenities of stardom blazing his or her own path whether it is Napster, Facebook, or You Tube, it may not be clothing or cool, but just the same are creations by people looking to do something different, how this relates to the circle of economic entrapment is by the sheer volume of choice today, why spend money on two brands of shirts when you can buy ten different kinds of shirts, creating this new facade of individuality, that's the key, painting your own personal existence, though most choose to replicate socially accepted norms that feed on those trends like locust, creating more anonymous corpses, but generating tons of dollars, even for the socialy unique, there is a global shopping center via the internet, piece by piece the puzzle, the new skin, a fabric compiled at a fiber to fiber, thread to thread, molecule to molecule level, a collage of cool, transcending decades, millenium of individuality. From Ebay to Amazon, a mouse click away from that virtual hologram that makes the other hipsters at the night clubs pull me aside when I wear an indie design hand made T-shirt that no one has and only a few have heard of the brand name, this is our economic consumer landscape, producers of goods have us all on the quest for companionship, clout, and artistic freshness that controls me like an automated zombie, slowly fading this retro artifact of a shopping mall I stand in right now into the cosmic dust of cyberspace except for those who have no other option. The journey for the attainment of popularity will be long, hard, expensive, and at the end of it all nothing more than a vaccum offering empty promises inside a suit which slowly erodes over time, that no amount of high fashion can reverse.