the expanse of hallway outside my hotel door
seems to go on forever
the space seems to embody an otherworldly feeling
between our world and some other
indescribable place
is it comforting or claustrophobic?
I used to visit our small town mall
when I was young, it was bustling with life
it had a movie theater
with endearingly tacky Electra-Dye carpets,
an arcade, and a Borders bookstore.
years passed, and the place became a husk.
movie theaters are on the decline,
and the bookstore went bankrupt.
malls are shutting down all over the world
due to the popularity of online shopping
and digital streaming.
movie theater architecture no longer looks like
an odyssey into space,
but a hotel lobby with neutral colors.
humanity left it all behind.
we gave these spaces life with our humanity.
the liminal spaces were alive with the
frenetic energy of living.
they were meant to be inhabited.
I visited our local mall.
there were only a few other people.
it felt like I wasn't supposed to see it that way— devoid of life, devoid of the meaning
humanity described it.
it became a relic of the past.
I wandered the hallways
and saw the movie posters they displayed.
the showings were from seasons before,
and they were peeling off the walls.
it felt like I was left behind too.
liminal zones are really the state in between
the past and the present,
nostalgia and the modern age.
the walls were just walls.
the carpets just carpets.
but my memories gave it meaning.
if birth is the beginning and death is the end
life is the liminal space.