Ye Olde Corner Store

I love living in a small, old neighborhood. While it does have its negative moments (like two nights ago, when our next door neighbor, Chatty Cathy, and her equally conversational friends had a gab-fest on their deck into the long, dark hours of the night, keeping my parents awake, until my mom finally got up and shhh-ushed them out of the kitchen window), it also has some very pleasant ones. The houses are tightly packed together, the folks are generally friendly and won't ignore you when you walk by, offering a nice "hello" or "can I pet your dog?" or "what cute kids!" With Halloween around the corner, houses are decorated left and right with items ranging from the ghoulish, to homemade, to giant blow-up structures (the kids like these the best, with Grace always asking to see the "siwwy spider" or the "swilly punkins"), bringing excited smiles to both the kids and myself. Our neighborhood boasts a wide array of inhabitants, and only in our neighborhood could/would this next event happen ...

We are blessed to have an old-timey "mom-and-pop" corner store right up the block from our house -- an old-fashioned general store, of sorts, that carries everything from candy and cigarettes to deli items, dry goods, and hot homemade dishes. Everything you could ever need is in that tiny store. I'm not sure how long the store has been there -- perhaps from the 'Teens or the '20s, since most of the homes (including ours) were built during that era. The current owner has been here for 23 years, and I remember (and loved) the former owner too -- an old man named Fred and his wife who revitalized the store from the owner before him. My mother recalls the old proprietor before Fred, when my parents first moved into their apartment upstairs when they were married, 49 years ago. The store was horribly run-down, with inches of dust covering the shelved items. Thankfully Fred turned the place around, and we've called it "Fred's" ever since.

I've been making weekly trips there to purchase fresh cheese and turkey for our sandwiches and quesadillas, as well as the occasional half-gallon of milk or other item that I've run out of. I like supporting our local mom-and-pop, and the kids get a kick out of what, to them, is the equivalent of a time-machine. The owner is very friendly, and gives my kids a free licorice stick or Swedish fish (my kids very, very rarely eat candy, so this is a big treat for them), or some other "penny candy" housed on the shelves behind the counter, just like Fred used to slip me a Tootsie Roll or a colorful, crinkly roll of Smarties over 25 years ago. Yesterday morning while we waited for our order, in walked the local fire chief -- or, I assumed he was a chief, because he was a fairly old man with lots of shiny badges all over his navy blue uniform shirt. Aidan was shyly awe-struck as he gazed at the man, who -- after a hearty "How ya doin'?" -- was engrossed in a conversation with the proprietor of the store, just like you're supposed to do in an old-timey corner store:

A conversation about his varicose veins.

Only in our neighborhood store ... ! He spoke of his treatment, the pain, his anti-biotics. He even pulled up his pant leg for greater illustration. That conversation went on for the entire length of our visit.

I truly love our neighborhood.