When Party City Opens Again

We drove through the parking lot of the strip mall. It was pretty much empty. Most of the cars were parked outside the grocery store. People hustled in and out.

Party City, right next door, was closed up tight. But someday, I told myself, that'll all change. There’ll be a lot of cars parked outside of Party City and people will be hustling in and out of there.

When all this quarantine shit in over, there’ll probably be a sudden huge surge in demand for party supplies. And the companies that manufacture supplies for Party City will probably have to retool their lines. Because Party City probably has a ton of stuff in stock that expresses standard celebratory sentiments such as Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas. But I doubt that they have anything that adequately expresses the sentiments of the outbreak of parties that will occur once this quarantine shit is over. The party supply manufacturers will probably have to make a bunch of decorations that just say WHEW!

And there will probably be new shortages. During the quarantine, the stores that are still open are usually out of toilet paper, cleaning products, rubber gloves, etc. But after it’s all over, Party City will probably soon run out of party decorations that just say WHEW!

But maybe not. A lot of people might not feel like partying, especially if they lost a loved one. Nobody would blame them for that. So maybe partying will be considered to be inappropriate, disrespectful or in bad taste and therefore will become an anachronism. Maybe Party City will never open again.

But maybe not. A lot of people died in World War II and when it ended there was dancing in the streets. I wasn’t there but I’ve seen pictures. People hugged and kissed and drank champagne. There were ticker tape parades. So maybe Party City will open again.




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