Where have all the children gone?

The other day I found myself at the Solomon Pond Mall – ostensibly looking for the 2600 meeting that’s supposed to happen there in the food court on the first Friday of every month. (Hint: nobody showed up.) On the other hand, I did get to spend a lot of time observing people. Or, more accurately, kids. Let me explain:

I’ve been out on the road for a while now, almost a decade. In all that time, I’ve never seen any kids out playing in their yards. I’ve seen plenty of signs like “Drive Slow: Children at Play,” but I’ve never actually seen these alleged children out playing.

This confused me for quite a long time. When I was young, if I wasn’t in school and if it wasn’t raining out, I’d probably be outside playing. You could drive by my house and see me and my brother & sister out in the yard, riding bikes, playing in the dirt – y’know, typical children-type stuff. But I never saw anyone else doing this sort of stuff, no matter where I went. (Aside from some inner city kids who play around in my neighborhood, but somehow playing in the trash of a shitty neighborhood in Fitchburg isn’t quite what I had in mind.)

So I wondered, where were all the kids? Inside playing video games? Watching TV?

Well, those two things may be true for some, but according to my recent observations, the answer really is “at the mall.”

There were more children at the mall than adults – something which shocked me. And most of them were fairly young – probably between 14 and 17, I’d say, although it’s hard to tell these days. And most of them were there without their parents or any sort of adult. They were wandering around in little gaggles of giggles, all dolled up in the latest fashions, and (since I was mostly in the food court) eating the worst kind of food.

I saw a lot of people eating, and every single thing was either deep-fried or sugar-coated. I took the liberty of watching what people were drinking, as well, and the most popular drink seemed to be a super-sized soda. I’m talking BIG here, not just “large,” but really, really BIG. I’d guess these things held nearly a half a liter of soda – or more.

Now, I’m normally not one to judge (okay, I take that back – I am one to judge, or else why would I be writing this), but I must admit, I had something to eat at the food court too, and it wasn’t a salad. It was an Arby’s Beef & Cheddar (if you can call it “cheddar”) sandwich. It’s a personal vice of mine, but frankly I eat them so rarely that it’s almost a “treat” for me. The last time I had one was more than 6 months ago. I also had a soda. A small soda. Because I just had one sandwich, why would I need more than just a little soda to wash it down with? In retrospect, I think I was the only person in the entire food court with a non-large soda. And there were a LOT of people in the food court.

I think I’ve found the downfall of our society. What scared me even more is that this was on a Friday evening/afternoon – and it was an absolutely beautiful day out (aside from a passing thunderstorm). So why in heavens name would you be inside?

Maybe it’s just that being in a mall always makes me angry for some reason. I think I have an irrational fear/hatred of large crowds, or maybe just overzealous consumerism. Or maybe it was the pre-teen girls wearing shirts that said “I had a nightmare I was a brunette.” Might as well just wear a sign that says “I’m going to grow up to be white trash.”

But maybe I’m being too harsh. No, wait… I’m not. It’s not like this mall was in Boston or some other big city, where there are no outdoor places to go. If you’re not familiar with the area, the Solomon Pond Mall is on the border of Marlboro and Berlin, Massachusetts. Not exactly “metro Boston.” Hell, not exactly “metro” anything! I know these towns pretty well (I lived in neighboring Clinton for a while), and there’s plenty of open space, even with all the recent housing & commercial development.

What really gets me is that many of these kids I saw were clearly not old enough to drive on their own – which means that their parents must have driven them to the mall (and presumably dropped them off there, letting them fend for themselves). I swear, it was like a modern-day Lord of the Flies – only set in a shopping mall instead of a tropical island.

I just feel quite strongly that kids should not spend their free time inside a mall – they should be outside, doing the things that kids (used to) do! Go ride a bike! Play tag! Play Frisbee! Play baseball! Take a walk in the woods! Grab a canoe and go paddling down a river! Climb a tree! Build a fort! Explore your world!

I place the blame for all of this squarely on the shoulders of the parents. Not TV, not video games, not mass media – PARENTS. Yeah, you heard me. You guys are the ones dropping your kids off at the mall, after all. Instead of doing that, grab a $2 Frisbee or some nerf guns or some super-soakers and set your kids loose on a field or at a park. Take them to a state/national park with trails and give them paper and pencils and tell them to take a walk and make a map. Make sure they have a bicycle (and a helmet) and let them out of the yard. Give them building materials for that tree fort they always wanted to make. Just let them BE KIDS!

Now that I’ve got that off my chest, I think I’m going to grab my camera and go for a drive somewhere, maybe take a walk through the woods and look for waterfalls to take pictures of. The rest of my seething anger will have to wait…

Peace out, y’all.

UPDATE: See my follow-up post “More on the ‘Missing Children’.” Apparently I’m not alone in this respect…