Taking it up a Notch

There are many people who enjoy shopping. I am not one of them. If there is something I need to buy, I will happily go to the appropriate store and buy it, but I am not interested in wandering around in a shopping mall for entertainment. My daughter, on the other hand, would like to do nothing else.

Every weekend I get, "Mom, I want to go to the mall." or "Mall, please." This generally starts around 7:00AM and doesn't let up until we go. For the first few hours I say, "Right, I know, But we have to wait for it to OPEN." That cracks her up. This past Saturday was no exception.

I decided early that I could not bear another aimless trip to Stonestown, the mall closest to us. I told her, "You want to go to a mall, I'll take you to a huge one with lots of stuff to see." We headed downtown to Bloomingdales in the Westfield Mall which is right next door and connected to the San Francisco Centre Mall. It is heaven for a mall rat like Maggie.

The big parking lot is behind these malls and you can enter from Mission Street. I will say the wheelchair entrance is about as circuitous as possible. You have to go up to the 5th floor theater level and walk through the cavernous theater lobby and then go down a separate elevator to the 4th floor get to the mall. It's accessible, but a complete pain.

Once you arrive, though you are treated to a view of the dome from the old Emporium Store. I'm so glad they saved this. It's stunning and brings back such fun memories of Downtown SF of yesteryear. (Perhaps this is the proverbial glass ceiling.)

You really cannot help but smile when you see it, whether you remember the old Emporium or not. It is just so beautiful and the area is completely filled with light.  Maggie didn't react at all, at first, because her chair is designed to keep her head facing forward. She was looking at all the people, oblivious to what was above her. Steve tilted back her chair and she reacted immediately. It was great to see her appreciate the beauty.

 We wandered over to the San Francisco Center with it's fabulous curved escalators. Maggie could not go on those in her chair, of course, but she thought it was pretty funny when I went up and kept waving to her. She waved back with all her might. 

This is taken from the top of the escalator,. I got on right behind them and rode up 

curving around in a half circle which  left me right where this picture is taken. 

We didn't buy anything on our shopping trip. This was just to give Maggie another experience and prevent me from going out of my mind. . I'm not sure it was a good idea, though. This may now be the expectation when she says she want to hit the Mall.