With a simple click of a mouse, parents can now buy everything needed for their soon-to-be schoolers and have it shipped right to their front door. To say things have changed in the last 50 years of shopping for back to school supplies would be an understatement.
Growing up at 110 Flamingo Street, clothes shopping wasn’t done with a click of a mouse. It was done in Big Brother’s James’s smelly closet. I’ll explain.
Being the last of four brothers meant getting a lot of hand-me-downs. From bikes to discarded pogo sticks, toys, and clothes, sooner or later all things bought for my older brothers found their way to me. As they outgrew it, or outwore it, it became mine, and since they grew quickly, that meant lots and lots of barely worn clothes.
When it came to back to school shopping, Mom left for the mall early in the morning with Older Brother Richard and James. When they returned in the afternoon, Twin Brother Mark and I went shopping, but not at the mall. Mom went with us as we shopped for our new back to school clothes in James’s closet. It was one of the few times we went into his room without getting pounded by pillows.
We were actually okay with the odd way of shopping. James got new clothes and we got his old ones, which were new to us. Besides, back then James grew so fast he didn’t wear them more than a couple of months, so they actually still looked new. Long and short-sleeved shirts, pants, socks and even shoes could be found in his closet.
We didn’t know it, but James had actually acquired a lot of his clothes from Older Brother Richard who also only wore them for a few months. Even so, most everything looked better than what we were currently wearing, so Mark and I were happy.
After shopping for James and Richard and buying us all school supplies, if our parents had any extra money, Mom would take Mark and me to the store. She let us each buy one pair of blue jeans.
Now, looking back, I realize that each year they always seemed to find some “extra” money, and each year we got one pair of new blue jeans. Funny, we wanted Mom to wash those jeans over and over so they wouldn’t look new. Everyone knew wearing new jeans to school is the quickest way to get made fun of.
I still remember the excitement of shopping at the mall, even if it was just for one pair of pants. Afterwards we went downtown to the Varsity for lunch. I always got hotdogs and onion rings and a large orange frozen drink.
I got something else: the brain freeze that came after trying to drink it too quickly. Now that’s something you can’t get with a click of a mouse or delivered to your front door.
[Rick Ryckeley has been writing stories since 2001. To read more of Rick’s stories, visit his blog: storiesbyrick.wordpress.com.]
