Yes, the clothing store from the 80's and 90's called The Gap.  I usually don't c&p articles here but I could NOT find a link to copy for this part of Kevin's article today.  I did post the recipe for applesauce cake in the foodie section here, but had no way to get this article to you except to copy it outright.  Hope Kevin doesn't mind!

My youngest son used to work at The Gap here in my town when he was in high school.  He LOVED to hang out at the mall (that was before we had to worry about someone running around in crowded places with guns and stuff).  When he stopped working at The Gap he went to work right next door at a place called Game Stop (he was a gamer even then!), then Office Max, then on to his job now at the USPS.  He still is a fan or games and now he's got 10 kids and is in his mid-30's, so not a lot of "game time".  I used to go to the mall to the huge huge huge Target store there, and right outside of Target was a big fat pretzel place.  I got mine with just plain chunks of sea salt on them and dunked them in mustard.  YUM, makes my mouth water when I think about those.  Haven't had one in years because the swimming pool here serves pretzels like that but they only serve with hot cheese.  YUK who wants cheese on a pretzel??  Not me.

Anyway, if you were a parent in the mid 1980's and early 1990's (of a teenager) you'll fondly read this story, I guarantee it!! 

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I read an interesting article today about how clothing store, The Gap, is struggling. (Mine: is there ANY store that isn't struggling right now?). This passage from the article pretty much sums it up:

The Gap rode the expansion of suburban malls in the 1980s and 1990s, becoming one of the largest mall stores in the United States. So its fortunes have primarily been tied to those of malls — great news in the '90s, but awful news now.

SIGH, so much to unpack here. I look at my wardrobe now, and it's so "middle-aged Dad,"…which I am generally okay with… I'm wearing khaki cargo shorts and a turquoise-ish t-shirt now; I think both are from Target.

The t-shirt is definitely from Target (I just checked the tag), the shorts, well, maybe they are Old Navy (owned by The Gap, so that is something). But shopping at the Gap? Geez, I really, until I read this article, had forgotten about The Gap. My local mall used to have a Gap. Back when we had a local mall. The Gap closed eons ago, and the mall is scheduled to be razed soon. If you were "cool" in high school, I remember you shopped at The Gap. And if you were super cool (not me), you bought clothes at Merry-Go-Round, which was in another nearby mall. The Merry-Go-Round is long gone, and that mall is on life-support.

I guess Gap clothes somehow lost their "cool" factor, and tying your fate to malls was, in retrospect, like purchasing a ticket on the Titanic.

I think my daughters have been inside an actual traditional enclosed mall (not counting outlet malls, hybrid lifestyle centers, etc.) a number of times that could fit on one hand. When I was their age, malls were a mainstay, an almost daily part of our life: want to meet friends? Go to the mall. Eat? Go to the mall. Buy clothes? Mall. The mall was the answer to everything, and now the mall is the answer to nothing.

Sometimes the demise of the mall is a mystery to me…I mean, what better than to have everything under one roof? I guess Amazon killed the mall along with so many other things.

If anyone has been to The Gap recently, let me know. Meanwhile, I'll cling to my fond mall memories….

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Like I said earlier, malls nowadays are probably not a really great idea unless you want to become a practiced mass shooter.  I would be far to scared to bum around in a mall now.

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