The Grand Conspiracy

I was talking to a woman friend of mine on Thanksgiving Day reviewing the big event. After the normal turkey talk, the conversation got to shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. I don't usually bother trying to get out since it is so crowded. It is a day for professionals. I don't think that I have shopped the "biggest shopping day of the year" since the early 80's, but I had already decided that this year I would brave it and go to the mall. My friend explained that she and her mother were going to go shop together.... Something they did every year. "Well... that's nice that ya'll get together like that."

So on Friday I went to the mall. I like to people watch, so the larger crowd would just make the stroll from store to store that much more interesting. I had been in the mall for about a half hour and thought of what my friend had said. She and her mother went together..... not she and her family.... just she and her mother. As I looked around the corridors I saw a few guys, a few guys and girls, and a few girls by themselves. Overwhelmingly though, everywhere I looked, there were mothers and daughters. There were even grandmothers, daughters, and grand-daughters.

I thought, "What a cool thing that all these daughters are here with their moms. Walking, talking, enjoying the fellowship of shopping together." Hey. Wait a minute. All of a sudden a cold feeling hit me as the hair stood up on the back of my neck. "This is where they get it." The training. The shopping thing isn't instinct after all. It is a trained response.... And there I was in the middle of the training ground. I looked to the left and the right. Yes, that's it. They were everywhere. In teams. There were Moms that were 40 years old with 20 year old daughters and 40 year old daughters with 60 year old moms. They come back every year for refresher courses in basic over-shopping. I began to worry that they could look at my face and tell that I had figured it out. As the vision grew in my mind I kept expecting Rod Serling to step from behind a plant and welcome me to the Twilight Zone.

This explains a lot of things. About the first of November you know how your wife gets. "Honey don't make any plans for the day after Thanksgiving. You know I want you to go shopping with Mom and I." And a week later, " I know things are busy at work but don't even think about going to the office the day after Thanksgiving. We are going shopping and we plan on staying most of the day." And then, the Monday before Thanksgiving, "Sweetie, we think we can make it to two malls and an outlet center if we have your help." All the while you are thinking that they want you there and every time shopping is mentioned you wonder what you could possibly do to get out of it. It all became clear to me that day. This is just a clever ploy to get you to go to the office, or their favorite - get you to go golfing or hunting or something for the entire weekend.

Yes. I have discovered the secret. My life may be in danger for revealing it. I don't know what can be done. Probably nothing at this point... the social imprinting has been going on for centuries. The most that we can gain from this is the knowledge itself and perhaps....with this awareness... we can one day learn to go shopping with them, at least in self-defense from the conspiracy that besets us.

NAH!! Let's go golfing or hunting or something.