Window Shopping

Downtown Stroll

Death of a way of life

Having already taken care of all his business for the day, Malcolm decided to take a walk down Main Street. It had been a while since he last window shopped. And he had not been inside any of the downtown shops in months. He wondered if there was anything new or different about Main Street.

At first he was shocked by how empty the street was. Most of the parking spaces were empty and he could count all the pedestrians on one hand. It was eerily quiet. At this time of the afternoon Main Street was usually quite busy.

Malcolm planned on walking down the four blocks of one side of Main Street then walking back on the four blocks of the other side of the street. That way he could cover the entire shopping district.

In the first block he noticed two Going Out of Business signs. One of the businesses was a jewelry store. Since Malcolm had no one to buy jewelry for this closing did not impact him much, in fact he had never been in that jewelry store since he moved to town five years ago.

The second business that was closing was a high-end kitchenware store. After first moving to town he spent a good deal of money in that store. About a third of his kitchen came from that store. But he had not been in that store in a couple of years.

The next block had one store closing; the print shop. Malcolm had done some business with that store but not since he bought his own printer a year and a half ago.

The next block had a store that had already gone out of business; the bookstore. That was not surprising. Bookstores were closing all across the country for years now and soon would be relegated to past history just like movie video rental stores. A surge of guilt erupted as Malcolm thought about all the books he had recently ordered online.

He was truly surprised on the next block to see that one of the two Mexican restaurants was closing down. The other Mexican restaurant offered home delivery and this one did not so maybe it was not such a surprise after all.

Crossing the street, Malcolm saw that the women’s clothing store was closing down. There were no longer any fashionably dressed mannequins in the windows. He had never even been in that store.

He then passed an empty storefront and stopped because he could not even remember what business had been there.

Passing the donut shop he saw that there were several customers inside. It was probably the busiest store of them all — along with the liquor store.

The remaining blocks had four more businesses that were closing down. As Malcolm passed stores he noticed that so many of them had no customers inside. By the time he had finished his Main Street stroll he was rather depressed. He had witnessed a slow and painful collective death of a way of life. What made it worse is that he knew it was happening in small towns everywhere in the country.

Saddened, Malcolm went home and fixed himself a cup of tea then booted up his computer. He then got out his credit card and placed it on the desk next to his computer so that it would be at the ready.

Copyright by White Feather. All Rights Reserved. This is a work of fiction.