Every once in a while, I come across something – usually an image, but it could be a scent or a sound or a taste – that takes me back. Not to a specific time or place, but that particular timelessness of a blend of memories, the kind that most everyone who was ever at such a time and place hold in common.
This post at Sippy’s place inspired such a memory, a while back. For whatever reason, today I thought it might be worth sharing. Maybe you remember it, too.
(“Safeway Interior” by Ralph Goings, 1974)
For anyone who was in a grocery store in the 70s (and even early 80s), it brings back a whole host of sensory memories: the heat of the summer sun beating through the window mixed with the cool air-conditioned shadows; the subtle smells of styrofoam, charcoal and potting soil warmed by those same windows; the anticipation of a bank of gumball machines by the doors (and the plea for a nickel or dime to put in the machine); a box of animal crackers, clutched in a chubby toddler’s hand by the little string across the top; the baking asphalt outside; and oddly enough, the cars – oven hot, smelling of a particular combination of vinyl, glass, metal and plastic, the heavy creaking and thunking sounds of solid metal doors opening and closing, the bouncing suspension as groceries and siblings get loaded in, burning hot seats that make the skin sweat and stick, and cracks in the vinyl that pinch unwary legs, an 8-track cassette sticking out of the car stereo…
I could go on, but you get the picture. I’ll bet you were there, too.
-o.o-
