Roommate Reflections

Picnic at the Mall

For some reason all of The Roommates are a little fuzzy on the how or why of it, but we think it started as a scavenger hunt that we made up for Dee's birthday. Roommate birthdays were always a big deal, and we always did something fun.

And so we came up with a scavenger hunt, a list of things we needed to accomplish and get pictures of ourselves doing. Since Sunflower was our resident photographer, she brought her expensive camera and took pictures of all of our activities.

On our list--and I have no idea how we came up with this--was a picnic in the parking garage at the mall.

So we loaded up our picnic basket with food and beverages, utensils and plates, and a blanket upon which to set it all.

The parking garage at the mall near the college was three levels--the ground, the middle, and the top. The top wasn't shaded, so we didn't want to be there, and there would be too much foot traffic on the ground level, so we took our picnic to the middle level.

We spread our blanket in the space between the elevators and sat down, enjoying Roommately conversation and partaking of a delightful lunch.

Mall patrons stepped around us, some eyeing us askance, some laughing, and some engaging us in conversation regarding the purpose of our picnic.

We were about fifteen minutes into our picnic when a pair of mall security guards approached us.

"You can't have a picnic in here. You have to leave."

"Why?" we asked. "Is there a rule about not having a picnic in the parking garage?"

"You just can't."

I suspect that it was probably a fire hazard or some other sort of danger, but whatever the reasons, the security guards didn't actually know it, but proceeded to kick us out, insisting that "you can't have a picnic in the parking garage of a mall."

So we left, casting ferocious glances behind us at our tormentors as we left, and proceeded on to the next item on our Scavenger Hunt list.

To Be Continued...