Where We Were

so we decided to make Friday our shopping day, the day where we would “take care of that Christmas list” by double teaming it during our annual pilgrimage to the MALL. well aware that partaking in consumerism within densely stocked stores densely placed within acres of concrete and pavement tends to make me giddy with depression, I prepared myself ahead of time – talked myself down, took on an optimistic outlook, a ride-with-the-waves mentality. so we walked into the mall and made our way through the large stores into the main mall complex, past the Santa picture-taking and the cell phone salesman with the alluring foreign accent, past the kiddie rides and the little pig that flips and oinks outside the toy store. we passed an elderly man in Velcro shoes slowly eating an ice cream cone when suddenly my wife says quietly, “Here we are.”