What's it (m)all about?

Sigh.

A blogster's work is never easy. And while many of us blogsters expand our writings into areas outside the original scope of our respective blogs, we generally do try to keep our focus on the task at hand. So when a friend asked how - after an amazing presidential election in the USA and with only 3 weeks left of my hiatus - I could write about malls, I had to sigh.

Sure, I could write about hope and how some folks in the US have found themselves being patriotic for perhaps the first time in their lives. And I could jump on that bandwagon filled with pundits opining about change and how we all must meet and embrace the changes to come. Or I could encourage and praise and the like.

Instead, I wrote about malls.

But perhaps, just perhaps, in writing about malls and the transition that has occurred to our definition of malls from a social outdoor area to a shopping center in which we spend money, I am writing about hope and change. Maybe I'm encouraging people to examine why they buy more than they need (or can afford), and maybe I'm praising those who don't simply buy to have something or get into borrowing money that they can't pay back.

Maybe in my assessment of the feelings that underlie our current need for more clothes and things to wear (more than we can possibly need), I am deftly pointing out that we caused the change from 'mall' to 'shopping mall', and if we want to change the word back to the promenade lined with trees, we must choose a social life outside of shopping and accumulating things to fill the emotional gaps in our life.

Maybe I'm saying that the "yes we can" starts with us.