As Time Goes By

This summer I took a trip out to Toddville with my friend Ann Foley. Our objective was to talk with some residents of the area to add to a book we are working on called A Dorchester Scrapbook. I took my camera and snapped some shots of various buildings along the way.

Scattered across the marsh country are any number of small country stores with their doors shut and signs fading into soft pastels. One person Ann talked to said there were six of these little mercantiles in a two-mile area. As such, it became evident that people could walk to the neighborhood store and pick up what they needed. A good many of these little places offered credit - the customer could charge their purchases and settle up the tab on payday.

Today, in our era of technology and instant gratification we have to pay for the goods before we can cart them home. If we don't have the cash, no problem. Simply put the charge on your credit card and you are off! Don't even think about the huge interest the card company will add to balances not paid off each month!

So much has changed from the day of the neighborhood store, and having grown up in a similar community in the Appalachains of Pennsylvania, I think of our little grocery store with nostalgia. I would love to see the place again, to check out the big wheel of cheese near the cash register and the candy counter where dreams were spent and fingerprints were left on the glass barrier between the shopper and the sweet.

The old days have a certain charm, but we have to live in today's world of computers, cell phones, and flat screen TVs. I have an idea all the technology that has blossomed during my life is both good and bad.

Sure, we can get things done in the wink of an eye. Just send an email!

I think we miss the community where people greeted passers-by from porches and husbands went down to the store to discuss cars and ball games around a potbelly
stove.

The world is changing - as the world has done and I sometimes wonder if we are not all stuck in the starting position. When it all gets to be too much, I try to get outside and take a walk on the sunny side. I hope you do too! Love, Terry