I Remember When....

I knew I was getting old when the all too familiar smell of my childhood hangout no longer existed. It's my story of "I remember when", like my folks used to tell me:
I remember when I walked through ice and snow to go to school.
I remember when I used to steal rides on the back of the ice truck.
I remember wringing the heads of chickens and then eating them for dinner.
I remember the depression, I remember the war.
I remember when there was no TV and we gathered around the radio for entertainment.

My list of "I remember whens" are less dramatic:
I remember when we went to the movies for double features - two movies PLUS a cartoon, no previews.
I remember when the Helms bakery truck would announce its weekly arrival in our neighborhood with its distinguished tooting horn. I would stand behind the truck as the driver opened up the long wooden drawers filled with donuts of every kind. Sugar donuts - my favorite!

I remember being awaken by the clinking of the glass milk bottles when the milkman delivered them to our back door, before the sun ever came up.

I remember the smell of where my dad worked. Benson's Garage was just a 5 minute ride on my bike, past my friends houses, past the hospital, next to the liquor store. I love the smell of car grease....it takes me back to when I would watch my dad work on cars. He wore coveralls that were stained with the grease of daily jobs. His name was embroidered above his chest pocket.

I begged to be taught how the engine worked. I love the gears and all the parts. He kept a pail of kerosene next to his work bench, where greasy carburetors soaked to be taken apart and cleaned. All those parts, and he knew how it all went back together again. When there was an odd tapping of the engine, my dad would take a long screwdriver, place the tip end on the offending piece of metal, and the handle on his ear. I loved going on test drives with my dad, as he listened to the sound of the engine, as if he was a conductor of a great musical piece.

I took my new computerized car in to get checked the other day. It wasn't sounding right. I knew the sound of what it should be. I was listening. The receptionist led me to the back, in her clean nicely dressed clothes, thru a waiting room with gourmet coffees and filtered water bottles. Neat air conditioned offices lined the hallway on either side. I was "allowed" out back, to a roped off area to see the "shop". It was so clean. Cars were lined up in straight rows. There were no smells. There were no buckets to hold parts. There were no men in greasy coveralls, when at the end of the day, would scrape the grease from under their fingernails. Instead there were cars hooked to computers trying to diagnose the problem. It was state-of-the-art. The latest. It stank. Not with something my nose could pick up, but what my heart was left with–Nothing.

I remember when there no such thing as a computer, and people figured it all out, by listening.