RIP, K-Mart

I learned about this through, of all things, what was supposed to be a clickable ad next to my Yahoo! e-mail account.  The K-Mart close by me is closing.

What?  Well, now that I think about it, I could see that coming.  The last time I was there was ... well, I don't know, it could have been a year ago, maybe the year before that or the year before that.  This K-Mart has been there probably before I was even before, and the last time I went, it showed: Warehouse setting, high ceilings with what looked to be asbestos, water stains everywhere, crowded aisles filled with products strewn everywhere, and workers who were either too overwhelmed or indifferent to do anything even resembling customer service (not to say they were rude, but I didn't get a really friendly vibe the last time I had went).  Of course the main reason I didn't buy anything was because their prices could not compare to what I could have at Wal-Mart or Target.

Nevertheless, I have always appreciated it being there, if driving past it and looking over and saying, "Wow, K-Mart's still there!" counts as appreciation.  Yet when I learned that logic and the invisible hand of the free market finally killed off this K-Mart, I could not help but feel guilty that I didn't go there more often.  Yes, merely visiting because I didn't want to buy things I could get cheaper elsewhere wouldn't make any sense.  I don't know, in the face of a store's impending close I think about how I could have stopped in from time to time to buy something, in a vain effort to singlehandedly keep a business afloat.  But the combination of the demise of the K-Mart brand, the rise of cheaper and hipper stores like Wal-Mart and Target, and the location of this particular K-Mart finally was too much for this particular store to stay alive.

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I could have stayed home for Thanksgiving.  Maybe I should have.  But because it was the holiday I decided that I was not going to treat myself with staying home and watching football.  Instead, I decided to go over to K-Mart and at least look over what deals they have.  At the very least I could pay homage to the place that once was our primary department store.

Since this place was closing down, and also because it was one of the stores open Thanksgiving Day (in fact, all K-Marts around the country were the first stores open for the holiday; I think this one was open at 8 in the morning), the parking lot, for once, was full.  When I came in the people occupying those cars were picking on the flesh of this K-Mart Karcass, throwing away any of the apparel items and products that were going for 50%, 70%, even 90% off.  Everything indeed had to go because K-Mart was going.

And that incentivized me to open my wallet and buy something.  None of the things I needed to buy.  Hell, neither of them I really wanted to buy.  But this place was going soon, and I wanted to buy something in homage to its permanent closing.  Plus, you couldn't beat the deals.

So I looked at the Men's Apparel racks and thought, You know, I could fortify my supply of shorts.  So I bought one, which may be a little small for me, but I'll lose weight.  Then there was cotton underwear which may be good enough as "porno shorts."  Then I got a t-shirt I didn't need at all, but it was going for three bucks, plus it was orange, and I don't have an orange t-shirt, so there's that.  Finally, I got pants which the checkout guy gave me for, I think, 80 cents.

I then spent my time going around the store -- ostensibly to shop, but mostly to say goodbye.  A lot of the retail space was already picked through, so I didn't have to go through everywhere, since more than half of the place was empty.  Everything else that was on sale was packed into, oh, 33-40% of the store.  And it was depressing to see all the Christmas tree supplies and bedsheets thrown onto shelves willy-nilly.

I didn't need Christmas tree supplies or bedsheets, but I moseyed on over to where the pharmacy side was and saw some pills that I could use, someday.  I saw some antacid and remembered the time I ate something and felt my heart was burning and wished I had antacid and didn't.  So I bought it as well as aspirin, thinking both items were on sale.  Also got some travel-sized toothpaste and deodorant.  Finally I saw some food, which is something I don't ever remember buying at K-Mart, other than candy for Halloween.  Got Gatorade Prime and 2, plus fun-sized packs of Twix and Hershey's.  The total: $70, $30 of it on the antacid and aspirin.  Maybe you can't discount medicine.  Whatever; all sales were final.  And I ran back in after I checked my car's owner's manual and saw that there was one type of headlights that was hanging on a rack.

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I didn't remember when, or even if, there was an announced last day.  Saturday, after I was driving to my storage bin, I saw two very desperate hawkers standing on the curbside (just like beggars) holding a sign that said "Last 2 Days!"  Oh, I remember seeing such a sign inside the store Thanksgiving.  So after dumping my stuff and working out, I decided to go back into K-Mart and take another look inside.  I was open to buying things, but mostly I just wanted to say goodbye, one last time.

As bad as Thanksgiving was, seeing even more people sifting through fewer items marked for even cheaper prices made me even more sad.  There was nothing else I wanted to buy, except for the Gatorade Prime, and I stayed away once I looked and saw that there was some dried crap on it.  The fake Christmas trees and sheaves of paper weren't selling, but everything else was going, many of it at 90% off.

I walked out of the shelves that still had stuff, and went to the Kuiper belt of the K-Mart, which was now three-quarters of the store.  I looked at the corners of the warehouse where I once walked, even though I dared not to physically walk over there because all of the vultures looking through clothes and stuff would think I was weird.  There, on the side, was where you could buy pizza.  And in the corner was where I made my last purchase out of my own volition, a pair of Route 66 jeans.  And that spot, over there, that was the shelf where I, in my desperation for finding a Halloween costume that wasn't one of those plastic mask-and-shirt-and-pants thingies, found and bought a "Generic Halloween T-Shirt."  All of those memories, now gone.  What was left was ripped-up white linoleum and piles of dirty crap where the shelves used to stand.  The burial was well underway.

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Sunday night was the last night.  I didn't think I would have time, since I had to work the Vikings game.  But I checked the sign and it said that they were going to close at 8.  Just in case, I made one final, final goodbye and went to K-Mart after the game.

I thought it was possible that they would close before 8.  The local Rainbow Foods closed during the day, probably because everything was bought.  And, sure enough, when I got over there, the only thing lit up was the concentrated store lights; none of the parking lights were one, and neither was the K-Mart, lit for so many years, all of the years in my life.

Well, there was one other light; the glow of the vending machine just outside the front door, right around where the small rides were, where I would ask my parents or Grandmother or my aunt or uncle to put in a quarter so I could go around the carousel or ride the airplane.  I wanted to make one final purchase at K-Mart, so this Pepsi machine was going to be it.  But I slipped in a quarter, it got stuck, then I pushed it in with my key, and it took it, and it didn't register.  So I didn't get a Pepsi.  One final donation, K-Mart: Thanks for the memories, and good luck to you.

Like I did yesterday, I had to take a couple pictures of what once was K-Mart, for posterity's sake.  It was eerie, and sad, and fitting.  This is the final shot of the death of a once-proud store, and the end of another connection to my past.