The Sunday Memory Drawer - The Five and Ten

Also frequently known as the "Five and Dime." I never understood the name. At one point, was everything in the store actually priced at 5 or 10 cents? Or, is that an urban legend like things costing 99 cents at the 99 Cent Store?

Regardless of the price structure, these stores were big when I was a kid in Mount Vernon. We had two of them on the main shopping thoroughfare known as Fourth Avenue, which is now pretty much nothing more than a collection of thrift shops and stores specializing in Caribbean and Haitian merchandise. Gag. In its heyday, my friends and I always descended upon our local 5 and 10s. We had, of course, F.W. Woolworth. But, there was also a knock-off a few doors down the block called H.L. Green, a store that is personally noteworthy to my reader and good friend Leo---his mom worked there for years. Why the owners of these stores were so secretive about their first names has always been a mystery to me? But, at the same time, who can explain F. Murray Abraham or J.C. Martin? But, I digress...

The best part about these stores was the fact that they sold everything. You could easily go in there with your mom and you both could be distracted for a while. She could go poking around for clothes or housewares, while you carefully surveyed the Toys & Games aisle. For some reason, I always remember these action figures that I used to buy there. Herman Munster. Each one of the Beatles. And several iterations of James Bond characters.

There was a pet department, but, for some reason, all you ever saw was goldfish and parakeets. I remember once connecting with a bird behind a cage. The eye contact perhaps was a little too much as it literally dropped dead off its perch in front of me. I got to call the clerk, and also was sure to add the tried-and-true kid response.

"I didn't do anything."

In those days, there were lunch counters in these stores, and, when I start going to junior high school nearby, I used to skip the cafeteria slop for a tuna fish sandwich there. Reading the Daily News with my lunch at a counter. Oddly, I was probably no more than 12 years of age. Perhaps one of my earliest "adult moments."

Woolworth's also holds claim to be the location for perhaps the only time where I got hit by my grandmother. Actually, it was a lot more than a hit. A slap. Clean across the kisser from right to left. Forceful and, in retrospect, deserved. I can recall the set-up to this very day. I was no more than 5 or 6 and both grandparents were surveying the wares. Up and down every single aisle with me in tow. And, as my grandparents would do, they would discuss it all together. In German. Not wanting to feel left out, I would join in. Not in German, but in some gibberish that I would punctuate with the word "ich" to make it sound German.

"Garble, mutter, mutter, garble, ich, mumble, garble, ich, mumble." I probably sounded like Adolf Hitler in his crib.

My grandmother asked me once to stop it. I was a kid and had to adhere to the strict rules governing my age group. I didn't listen.

"Garble, mutter, mutter, ich, garble, garble, ich, mutter, mutter." On and on and on and on.

Somewhere around Toiletries, she had enough. To this day, when somebody uses the expression "hauled off and slapped," I remember my grandmother.

CRACK!

I didn't cry. The shock of it all just numbed me. I didn't say another word the rest of the day. In any language whatsoever. Just thinking about it all again makes me rub my cheek. It still feels warm.

Ach du lieber!

Dinner last night: Belgian waffle at Waffle.