Back In The Day
Published in 2006 in Chicken Soup for the Shoppers Soul
My dad was a traveling salesman and on the road three weeks out of four. He’d come home for weekends, in time to save Mom from cabin fever and to drive us to the supermarket for our weekly shop. On Friday nights we kids would scarf our dinner down and plaster our faces to the front window waiting for Dad’s headlights to appear up the street.
Mom would start early in the day to get ready. She’d put on silk stockings – the real kind – and straighten their seams with spit-slicked fingers. She’s slide bobby pins out of her jet black hair and comb kiss-curls into a fashionable fringe. I loved watching her – the careful way she applied bright red lipstick, the smear of color powdered across her cheeks, the way she used the rim of a teaspoon to curl her eyelashes. I couldn’t wait to grow up and fancy myself like that.
Dad would arrive home with a week’s worth of dust and laundry. He didn’t seem as keen on the shopping adventure as the rest of us as we’d pile into the car like children bent on the circus. He and Mom would exchange glances and kisses, and we’d head off to the store. Dad would doze in the car, fedora propped on his nose.
In retrospect, we probably looked like a bunch of bumpkins, even back in 1959. My brother and sister and I found the automatic doors leading in and out of the supermarket magical, and sometimes got several laps of the circle completed before Mom settled the baby into a buggy and collected us. We’d follow her like a column of reprimanded ducklings, keeping our hands to ourselves and our voices down – our enthusiasm harnessed to a shiver.
We’d be especially good if Gramma was in town for a visit. She’d arrive on the Greyhound, bluish French roll, sensible black pumps and a secret stash of money that she kept hidden in a little white bag pinned inside her brassiere. We could always count on Gramma to dig into the little bag before we’d go to the store. We’d buzz with the anticipation of chocolate Puff cookies or sponge toffee and were never disappointed.
In those days we mainly shopped for staples — puffed wheat, peanut butter, laundry detergent with free towels hidden in the powder. Perishable items were delivered directly to the house. The milkman brought dairy goods to our back door several days a week. The clink of bottles in the chute would cause a stir in the kitchen, and we’d rush to the porch with our last-minute requests. The milkman wore a metal coin belt around his waist and could make perfect change without looking down. A couple of times a week, the bread man would rumble down the street. Mom would walk to the curb with her order and cash in hand. Sometimes he’d dish out day-old donuts to grubby-faced children. The Watkins man sold spices door-to-door from a black suitcase. The Fuller Brush man peddled a variety of products from his black bag.
It was a friendly way to shop; Mom was on a first-name basis with most everyone. The cashiers at the store made small talk while they processed our groceries. They were interested in the weirdest stuff- what recipe Mom was whipping up for Sunday dinner or what the weather might be like for the weekend. They’d always ask the questions with a smile on their faces and a genuine interest in the answer. They handled the most personal items with enviable nonchalance. Boxes of feminine hygiene products were bagged before the reached the bag boy.
Dad had an uncanny knack of appearing at the cash register just in time to pay the bill. I guess he was peeking from under his fedora while we thought he slept. When we got home, he would carry the paper bags into the house four at a time. He’d head back to the car for the baby and the kid who was pretending to sleep. He nestled the baby safely on one arm and fling the mock sleeper over his other shoulder like a sack of potatoes. The sleeper invariably giggled all the way inside and always woke up just as Mom pulled of his or her shoes and tried to tuck the pretender into bed.
Thinking back on those days, I realize that our grocery shopping adventures were some of the highlights of my childhood. They were family time when family time was scarce. They were also the prelude to whatever the weekend held for Mom and Dad. For years I thought the silk stockings and dolling up my mother used to do was for the benefit of the people at the store — I know better now.