ARTICLE INDEX
Ashby’s Drugstore on the corner of Chicago Street and Monroe Street in Coldwater, Michigan 1955. My hometown. I was five. The store and I, are both long gone from Coldwater’s Main street. My mother dragged me uptown as she ran errands. The pharmacy was small. The druggist was located in the back. At the front of the store were two crowded aisles with low shelves on either side crowded with all sorts of interesting things beyond adult items to attract my attention. Candy bars, Yo-yos, and many 10 cent toys. I busied myself with exploring the shelves.
Something shiny caught my attention. I let go of my mom’s hand and turned to stare at a cardboard display with a smiling kid admiring the small jackknife he was holding. A dozen or so knives were attached to the display. Well, I knew right then I had to have one. If that kid had one—why not me?
I found my mom talking to a friend. I interrupted the conversation. “Mom, can I get the knife?”
“Knife, what? No,” she said as she returned to her conversation. I returned to the display. When she finished she walked over and said “Let’s go.”
“Look, that’s the knife,” I said as I renewed my request pointing at the knife.
“You don’t need a knife.” At the cashier desk I asked again and was rebuffed again. The clerk laughed and said “he really took a shine to that little knife.”
Outside the store I tried again. “Mom, that kid has a knife.”
“What kid?
“The one on the counter!”
“A kid on the counter? What kid? There are no kids on the counter.”
“I‘ll show you,” I blurted as I grabbed her hand pulling it toward the entrance. She relented and we returned to the counter with the display. I pointed toward the display with the smiling kid and the tiny jackknives.
“Come on mom.”
“Okay, okay,” she exhaled, “but don’t you cut yourself.”
She took the knife off the display, paid the smirking clerk and handed me the knife. Outside the pharmacy she once again warned me to be careful. She then started a conversation with another woman she knew. I opened the knife and, of course, I immediately cut myself. At that point I thought it best to not bother my mom with this development. After all she was busy talking and it probably wasn’t in my best interest. A bit later the woman said “your son is bleeding.”
Mom was a nurse. Blood didn’t bother her. She laughed, shook her head and dragged me into the pharmacy to buy bandaids. All she said as we headed home was “I hope you learned your lesson.”
Seventy years later I still remember that lesson. Don’t buy something because someone on an advertisement is smiling.
Nine Years Before the Cross
ARTICLE INDEX