I went down to Front Street Deli for lunch today. After I ate, I went next door to Carter's Seed Store.

Carter's has been there for years, I guess. A long, narrow, glass-fronted storefront, stuffed to the roof with seeds and junk, basically. When I was a kid my mom would take me Downtown every once in a while - the trip to Carter's was always a high point.

So I go in there today and wander through, ending in the last room. There's a staircase down in that room, cobwebby and pitch-black. There's no telling what is down there.

The summer after I graduated from high school I took Sonya on her first trip to Carter's. That day I saw two neat things there: an antique straightjacket and a scrap of old black lace in the middle of the floor. I didn't buy the jacket that day - but I did grab the piece of lace. It decorated the breast pocket of a rather showy jacket of mine during my college years.

Today I walked in that room and saw a tattered old black dress and a rather dusty straightjacket. It was like getting in a goddamned time machine - back eight years just like that.

It's amazing the things that don't change, you know? God bless Carter's Seed Store.

back'ard

latest

archive

for'ard