The unmatch’d form & feature of blown Youth, says Ophelia.

From the film, Wonder Boys:

Hannah Green (Katie Holmes): James will know about George Sanders.
James Leer (Tobey Maguire): George Sanders?
Hannah Green: Mr. Crabtree was saying how George Sanders killed himself, only he couldn't remember how.
James Leer: Pills. April 25, 1972, in a Costa Brava hotel room.
Terry Crabtree (Robert Downey, Jr): How comprehensive of you.
Hannah Green: James is amazing. He knows all the movie suicides. Go ahead, James. Tell him.
James Leer: There are so many.
Hannah Green: Well, just a few. The big ones.
James Leer: Pier Angeli, 1971 or '72, also pills. Donald "Red" Barry, shot himself in 1980. Charles Boyer, 1978, pills again. Charles Butterworth, 1946, I think. In a car. Supposedly, it was an accident, but, you know, he was distraught. Dorothy Dandridge, pills, 1965. Albert Dekker, 1968. He hung himself. He wrote his suicide note in lipstick on his stomach. William Inge, carbon monoxide, 1973. Carole Landis, pills again. I forget when. George Reeves, "Superman" on TV, shot himself. Jean Seberg, pills, of course, 1979. Everett Sloane - he was good - pills. Margaret Sullivan, pills. Lupe Velez, a lot of pills. Gig Young, he shot himself and his wife in 1978. There are tons more.
Hannah Green: I haven't heard of half of them.
Terry Crabtree: You did them alphabetically.
James Leer: It's just how my brain works, I guess.

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It has been one year since I have been shopping at the Eaton Center. Perhaps I resist what I consider the purposeless voyage to identify myself as a starving artist, or because I’m saving for the future, or that I revel in the pride of a working class upbringing. Or perhaps it is because my relocation to Bloorwest has positioned me closer to the vintage sex that is Kensington market, which I have teased and had many times. And it’s been quite satisfactory.
Or perhaps it’s because I often find money, consumerism and the desire for material possessions symbolic of status and greed, and I say 86 the man. A large fraction of my wardrobe does consist of hand-me-downs from my sister (and I’m not ashamed to admit it), and even items off my good friend the clearance rack.
I’m not (but maybe I have been once) an extravagant spender. However, I have more material items than I want or need. I have a whole chest of dolls and train-sets covered in dust that those kids running the streets of Havana would make of better use. I have a lot of stuff. And my standards of “a lot” are comparable to the societal standard of a lot and my desire for goods technically is not significantly lower than the societal norm. This is all regardless of the fact that the bulk of the ideas I support would be semi-blacklisted given this was the McCarthy era.

So it has been approximately a year since I have been at the Eaton Centre shopping. Almost a year. Which means, I lied on the first line of this thing for impact. I lie sometimes. White lies. Fibs. Exaggerations. Just for something to tell the Priest at Saturday evening confession. Anyways. I finally had the time to venture for a morning-turn afternoon of mindless (but in my case mindful) shopping at Toronto’s most visited tourist attraction, so I went and I shopped.

The main event:
It’s a Thursday and the Center is stocked, decked and bursting at the waist-line with Holiday-themed goods and shoppers. I’m dolled up for the occasion. My face is all painted (make-up - my most obvious vice) and I’m wearing black dress shoes. And to me black dress shoes are synonymous to womanhood – the “dressing like I can afford it” me.

I’m here to purchase a plain, warm fashion boot and generally to absorb and enjoy the newly unpackaged holiday spirit, and the basic catharsis often associated with shopping. These plans were abruptly disrupted and prevented by the yelling mothers, nasty tweens, arrogant store clerks and cheap penny-pushers I was surrounded by. Canadians have a reputation for their good manners. Perhaps all of these people were from out of town?

My biggest mistake however, was my visit to Hollister. But now in retrospect, it is considerably less of an atrocity than it had seemed at the time. I actually uttered the words (in my mind) “Fuck Hollister”, and I don’t like to swear. I was lured in by its high budget art direction and catchy pop soundtrack pounding loud enough to hear a wing away from the actual store. Once inside I felt ambushed by peppy size zero’s and tanned OC wannabes trying to assist in making my Hollister experience a rather “fetch” one. Now, I like a lot of the clothing in Hollister, regardless of their cheap quality and simulated-thrift look. But I just couldn’t handle the cliental it attracts. Perfect-ironed hair, impeccable fake and bake tans and a waist-line the size of an asparagus. And this seemed uniform among the entire herd. No need for school dress codes when uniforms are already self-imposed, and provided by the good bettys and dudes at the Tiki-stand Hollister brand. Maybe I’m jealous of such perfection? But then again, maybe I’m not.

Being in this store reminded me of the evening before when I fell asleep watching the old adaptation of Brave New World 1980. Here, I felt like the Epsilon to the store clerk Alphas. And if Huxley’s world did become our fate, in reality I’d be at least a Beta; so you can imagine the strict regime the Hollister-Abercrombie-American Apparel juggernauts are imposing on today’s malnourished-by-choice youth. “History Is bunk!” I had to get out of there.

After going to 15 different shoe-stores on all 3 floors of the Eaton Center, I find myself wandering around the shoe department in Sears during a 2-hour-only 40% off sale. Celine Dion is roasting chestnuts over the P A system and the aisles are crawling with middle-aged shoppers who aren’t “browsing” but “scouring” for deals as if they were plowing through war wreckage for their missing young. My goodness I feel anxiety among a packed crowd.

I spend 4 and a half minutes staring at the display of ladies’ Isotoner gloves and it takes me into a world all my own. Everyone has disappeared except for me and these gloves. I look down at my hands and think of the hands I haven’t seen for two (this year three) Christmases. How sometimes my hands look like how I remember her hands to look. Skinny with knobby knuckles and dry skin from rinsing out the sink and bathtub with Mr. Clean or Vim. I catch a glimpse of something my own and think it’s hers. Do I see it, or do I just want it, like I want the boots. Exactly 4 and a half minutes go by.

After my daydream bubble pops, I see the boots I came for and grab them off the shelf. A man wearing dockers and a golf shirt approaches me and asks for my thoughts on the footwear I have in hand. He’s looking for his daughter. “For Christmas”, he says. I tell the man I bought the same pair last year, they’re inexpensive, look fine, and do a decent job for the label-less fake UGG that they are. He seems pleased by my sales pitch and picks up a box for his gift-list. That is until I lose control of my lips and tell the man that given the occasion a sandal would be more appropriate. He didn’t get I was referring to the fact that Christmas is Jesus’ birthday. I’m not that funny. I’ve come to accept it.

I manage to slip away from the awkward moment, and I find a quiet space to myself where I pen some thoughts in a notebook and prepare to try on my fake UGGz which are actually “Nevada” brand. God, I can’t believe I’m admitting that. I wore Nevada overalls in elementary school longer than a child should wear such a garment. I try on the boots and notice the lady beside me. She slips a stocking over her age-spotted foot and tries cramming it into a teal stiletto pump. Did I mention she smelled of tuna? This quirky (and kind of disgusting detail) set off my hunger alarm. So I try on the boots, swipe my debit card and motor to the Booster Juice for a large sized carrot juice. I feel good. Satisfied - which is more than I can say for everyone else running laps around me (around this mall) in search of things to fill the emotional wholes inside them. Or perhaps to celebrate a job well done. Either way I feel satisfied and I just want to get out of there and go home, shelve my purchases for those few occasions I go out and see people see me. I want to go home and wash my hands of the greed and rudeness I witnessed in a number of Scrooge-types. I wanted to forget the lack of Christmas spirit and the amount of brain cells I killed in Hollister.

Now, I know I said I’m never at the Eaton Center, and I just ranted about the wasteland of the size-zero marketing targets. But the next day I find myself at the mall again after having breakfast with my brother and his chic.

I’m walking on Yonge along the Santa Clause parade after devouring a mango-banana crepe topped with blueberries (yay anti-oxidants) only to detour through the Bay. On this day I find myself harboring a completely opposing sentiment to the experience the day prior. I took it all in. The Christmas store displays, the smiling faces, the twinkly santa eyes in all the parade-watching children. I was in the Holiday spirit and just wanted to throw dollars to the street. I sprayed my wrist with Chanel #5 and tried on party dresses as if I was in New York City and was actually a social debutante.

I found myself in the men’s department looking at all of the tweed vests, satin ties and feathered fedoras. These vintage pieces remarkably correlate with my recent obsession for Madison Avenue businessmen of the early 60s (brought to 21st century prime-time). But they also remind me so much of my old man back home. How every time I see him he ages more and more. But how he’s still there and will be for a long time. That one day, I will have the success he didn’t and can dress him up in designer threads and feel like I’ve earned it. I refuse to live off credit. And I refuse to live in debt. I value emotion more than dollars. I prefer to hold on to nostalgia than any material good I own.

And with that, I am left wondering how many people in this city will die this holiday, and I hope that they don’t spend that afternoon at the Eaton Center… or God-forbid, in Hollister.

I often contradict myself. This lie is true.
Time for my soma. – That’s better.
- Lo

If I were any Magic School Bus Character I would be: Carmen.