“We milked cows and always had cream saved up to sell,” my friend said. My family did too, as well as a large crate of eggs to take to town. These were traded “in kind” at the grocery store. Our small-town grocer would take your list, go around picking up the items and bring them to the counter to settle up. The locals could charge; paying monthly or, sometimes at year end, when cattle were sold. Ranch folks bought flour and sugar in hundred-pound sacks; potatoes too, if they didn’t raise their own. Pickles were sold in bulk and, if you needed cheese you asked for a pound and it was cut off a wheel to be weighed. I was amazed when my Omaha grandfather took me along to a supermarket where we had to push a cart and find what we needed.
Pop was sold in bottles; if you returned the bottle, you got 2 cents back. Saturday was the big day in town. Stores stayed open late and, after shopping, people stood on the street visiting with neighbors. Kids might go to the movie if there was a theater. Not a single store was open on Sunday.
Laundry soap came in cardboard cartons and often included a cup or dinner plate. Many women set their tables with freebie stuff, and made their children’s clothing from flour sacks. Toothpaste came in a metal tube that could be rolled up as it was used, so as to get the very last drop out. Condiments came in glass jars which could be used for canning. Milk was in glass bottles that were returned for refilling. And you thought recycling was a new thing.
I still have one set of sheets that were my mom’s. The fabric has softened with each washing and they are easy to fold, because the elastic is only at top and bottom. Of course, they are hard to keep on a mattress that is way too high and makes the bed hard to get into if you aren’t six feet tall.
I try to use a minimum of plastic products but it isn’t easy to shop that way. Only one local store has laundry soap in cardboard cartons and it’s not an inexpensive brand. And have we really become so selfish that we don’t think merchants and their employees deserve a day off on Sunday? That said, I do sometimes stop after church for something. It’s a trade-off for saving gas and fewer trips to town.
The good old days weren’t that good in every way. We didn’t have shots to prevent polio and other common childhood diseases. The car, if you had one, didn’t have AC or even a very good heater. There were fewer options for economic relief if you were poor, or unable to work. But people tended to look out for one another, and didn’t get into battles over politics and lifestyle choices. I guess we were aware that we needed one another, and generally had one another’s backs when the chips were down. And we knew the difference between needs and wants, so tensions between the haves and have nots weren’t as prominent.
Well, I’m out of here to buy eggs in Styrofoam, milk in plastic, and the laundry soap in cardboard. Sometimes we don’t have much choice.