Dead Malls, Double Socks, Haunt Season, and the Optimism of August
It’s that time again — my kids are getting ready to go back to school. Zac’s mother gave Beatrice a Target gift card for her birthday and instead of spending in on toys, she asked to spend it on “cool” back to school clothes. (Well, she did save a little back to buy a math set for her American Girl doll, who already has a biology and chemistry set, a tiny Girl Scouts uniform, and a number of bird-watching accessories.) Beatrice decided on a purple sparkly skirt, a t-shirt that touts her love of reading, and some iron-on patches to put on her jacket, and she convinced me to buy her a new backpack even though last year’s is still perfectly good, because the old one is too “second-gradeish.” She is also angling for some back-to-school-themed earrings, “maybe pencils.”
At the beginning of every school year, I would pore over the Mervyn’s and J.C. Penney’s back-to-school catalogues, circling twice my budget’s worth of chunky cable-knit sweaters with matching printed turtlenecks in Los Angeles’s sweltering August, aspirational in every possible way.
I have a vague but powerful memory of a line of inexpensive, primary color, mix-and-match kids’ clothes (I want to say it was called something like Color Connections?) where you could buy a sort of dead-mall capsule wardrobe of leggings, peplum skirts, and shapeless drop-waist jersey dresses. Last week I spent an hour on Pinterest trying in vain to find a photo of one of these catalogue spreads — if anyone out there knows what I’m talking about, please let me know, it’s killing me. (This also reminded me of my old Toast piece, “Ode on an Abandoned Shopping Mall,” without a doubt the very best Keats parody about early ’90s shopping malls in all of the internet.)
I was telling my friend Samantha about this last night and she reminded me of the beautiful, improbable moment when everyone wore double socks — one pair layered over the other — and my heart broke for all kids everywhere hoping that this wardrobe, this year, these socks, would be the game-changer, that this would be the school year that turned it all around.
Even though I haven’t been a student in almost 20 years, fall still feels like a new beginning to me. This year I’m getting my kids ready for the school year, I’m making plans for PTA and Girl Scouts and piano lessons and team sports, I’m putting away all the sandy bathing suits and S’mores-encrusted camping supplies from our summer trips. And of course, most importantly, it’s the beginning of Halloween season. Or, as they say in the business, “haunt season.” (I know this lingo because I’m currently reading through a stack of trade magazines for Halloween professionals.)
Last fall was not a great one for me. I was living in an apartment where the downstairs neighbors were constantly complaining about my toddler running around. I was commuting 2–3 hours each day, I was always rushing but still late to everything. My dog peed all over the house, my air conditioner was always leaking. My computer didn’t work, my phone didn’t work, my car didn’t work. My shower door literally exploded. One of my best friends moved away, and a close family friend died. I injured both my back and my foot, so it hurt to sit still and it hurt to move. A major piece I was working on got cancelled at the last minute. Leonard Cohen died (but I got a commemorative tattoo). On Thanksgiving, I got laid off and my boyfriend totaled his car on the same day, and that wasn’t even the worst day we had that year. Worst of all, I didn’t throw a Halloween party for the first time since 2000.
This fall is different. This fall I’m in a house I love with people I love and I’m writing a book and I have a brand-new kitten (!) and a Halloween party plan and a shower curtain that so far seems pretty inert. This fall I’m going to eat better, I’m going to be kinder, I’m going to drink more water, I’m going to buy some cool new clothes. This fall I’m going to really turn it around.
