Chapter 2

My Dad owned a grocery store and butcher shop.  It was fun growing up above a store.  We lived upstairs and the store was downstairs.  We always had fun things to eat.  Candy, pop, chips, ice cream.  We loved Pepsi.  Man, we couldn't get enough of the stuff.  Pepsi and Snyder's potato chips went good together.  

My Dad's sister, Aunt MaryRose, worked in the store too.  She was like an older sister, and always made things fun for us kids.  She did a lot of dumb things and got in trouble most days.  Getting in trouble with my Dad was no picnic.

One day she weighed my little sister (who wasn't so little) on the meat scale and broke it.  My Dad had a fit and made her pay for it out of her meager wages.  Another time she was painting buggies with silver paint, and it somehow ended up all over my brother, Donnie.  He looked like the tin man from The Wizard of OZ.

Another time MaryRose got really scared when a customer came in with a towel covering his hand.  She thought he had a gun, and when Daddy pulled the towel away it was a hook hand.  Poor guy was so embarrassed.  My Dad wanted to kill her.

Yet another time MaryRose got the shock of her life when she came face to face with a raccoon that was under the counter eating cigarettes.  My Aunt can scream louder than anyone in our family.  My Grandmother was a good screamer too.  We found that out when a giant sewer rat joined us for Thanksgiving dinner, but that's a whole other story.

My childhood was so fun.  My best friend was Carol Gardner.  She taught me everything.  How to play jacks, Chinese jump rope, hopscotch, canasta, badminton, croquet, mother-may-I, Simon says, rollerskates, pickup sticks, all kinds of stuff.  Carol was the best.

I remember wanting a hoola-hoop.  One of the best memories I have of my father was when he drove me all around looking for one.  He took me in his brand new big, green 98 Olds with push button windows.  What a car.  it took a long time, but we finally found a shoop-shoop hoola-hoop at Gaylord's.  It had beans in it, and make a cool noise.  It was hot pink, an no one else had one like it.  I was in my glory.  Thanks Daddy.

Us kids could play outside all day, but we had to be home before that streetlights came on.  If we didn't make it, my Mom was on that back porch screaming, "Michael, Donnie, Jodi, Tina!"

People never bothered us back then.  I'm sure there were lots of perverts around but they knew better than to come near us.  My father could easily castrate them in the back where the meat room was.

It's funny they never called them pedophiles.  My Aunt called them dirty old men, and she could spot them a mile away.  And just like my Dad, don't even think about coming near a loved one.  she will eat you up and spit you out.  She's kind a like Janice from the Sopranos.  Know what I mean?  

Anyhoo , I had a great childhood growing up at the store.  (Hi Aunt Mary Rose)

So much more to come......