Mallrats

Did anyone else see the inexplicable teenage mob at Alderwood Mall this past Saturday? (It’s a large shopping mall in Lynnwood, a suburb of Seattle.) Here are excerpts from a journal entry I was doing that day, when I planned to sort out magazines and newsletters, some of them years old.

12:40 – 1:50 Drove to Alderwood Mall. I walked around the mall twice on the inside for exercise.

1:50 – 2:35 Sorted through old magazines and newsletters I had brought with me. I did this in the food court, near the windows. A massive amount of teenagers were in the entrance to the food court from the main part of the mall, and in the food court itself. This made it difficult to walk through, because they were standing around in clusters, the way teens usually do.

2:35 – 3:25 I decided to get some lunch. The teenagers in the food court had reached critical mass. The majority of them filled the center of the food court, which is quite large. They talked loudly to hear each other in their clusters, which caused the cascade effect of their talking even louder. I tried to walk through them, but they were so densely packed it became physically impossible without shoving them aside. I squeezed my way out and did a circuitous route to the Panda Express.

            I observed them while standing in line. They did not seem to be in the mall for any big event. They were all in their clusters, talking among themselves, but not to other teens in neighboring clusters. They were so densely packed, shoulder to shoulder and back to back, they formed one big mob. They were all talking excitedly, taking pictures of themselves, and doing normal teen things, but all in a mass. They didn’t seem self-conscious of this odd gathering.

            All I could figure is that one group of teens would observe others standing around, so they would go to the “happening” place. They ranged from middle school to high school, with mostly no sign of parents.

            So I got my bowl of noodles and one entrée from the Panda Express for $8.78. It cost $1.25 extra because I chose the honey walnut shrimp. (Historians get an idea of how much food cost because of journal entries like this.) It took a long time because they had to cook up a new batch of the shrimp entrée. In other words, the crowds of teenagers were there from at least 1:50, and they formed the big central mass sometime after that. They were still that way when I sat down to eat. I’ve never seen this many teenagers all together at a mall before.

            I sat down well away from them and continued to observe them as I ate. Occasionally, a girl in one of the clusters would give out a squeal of excitement, but the teens in the other clusters wouldn’t notice. So again, there was no one event going on that attracted them.

            A couple of teen girls walked towards the massive crowd so quickly, their breeze blew the napkin off my lap.

            Eventually, a couple of security people showed up and inched their way into the crowd. After a while, the crowd dispersed, as slow as molasses. That meant clusters of teens were now wandering around the food court. They were still loud.

            I went back to my car to get more magazines and newsletters.

2:35 – 4:10 I did more sorting. The teenagers were pretty much gone, so the food court was back to normal.

I was tempted to take pictures of what I hope was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I don’t tend to publish pictures of minors without their parents’ approval. So here’s a generic picture of some teens.

photo by Alagich Katya

Just multiply in a dense space, and add those jeans with pre-torn rents in the front that some girls wear.