Let me go back to the little store east of Bray on highway 29. Open that screen door with the Rainbo Bread push/pull, always saying “It’s Good Bread”, though it may need paint to keep the letters alive. I’ll go and get a loaf or two of bread, spend twenty cents, as much as we will all eat ‘tween now and Sunday. There’ll be a two pound silver can of peanut butter, and I know, I’ll check the bottom of the can to make sure there’s no rust. Maybe they got syrup that we can mix it with Mommas butter, and I could eat them til forever.
I’ll get Daddy that round can of Prince Albert with its pop-off lid, that smell of the worlds finest tobacco all packed in that red decorated can with the man wearing that three-quarter length suit against that white background.
Yes, yes, I’ll remember to get Ain’t Birty that little jar of American Quality snuff that’ll keep her happy and she should then have six water glasses she can fill with marbles, pins, hair clips and her nightly glass of whatever.
I can see the wooden shelves, bigger on the bottom, smaller as you move up, to just a few cans wide on the top. I’ll grab a box of soap for the washing machine, I’ll get the one with the towel inside. That old concrete floor is cracked and chipped, but it is kept clean.
The smell of fresh made jams and Mrs. Curtain’s daylight fresh peach pies, and the blackberrys picked yesterday, the strawberries brought in this morning, all wrapped in a little wax paper and waiting for the day. So many things we could have, the counter all worn down, the cash box with its lid closed, and the day a waiting on the hill. I’ll be sure and wave to Mr. Curtain, out swinging the grass down, or pumping some gas, or watching the world go by from the rocking chair out front.
Ralph Peck
Photo by Belva Shelton
Stephen’s County, Oklahoma
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