AMAZON.......What's Up With That?

I know that to this current generation deliveries to our doors is nothing new; it's fast, convenient and efficient. Think pizza, restaurant meals, on-line purchases all in neat brown boxes, right on the door step. An absolute bonanza at Christmas. All pre-paid, since even the previous "Debit at the door!" is outdated.

It's 2023, and it's moving fast! I picked up a feed of fresh fish from the "fishman" this week and it proved fodder for a Blog. It got me to thinking....are we really better off?

It doesn't seem so long ago that much of the goods we needed got delivered to our homes.

In my grandmother's time, you depended on it.

In no particular order, I'd like to roll back the stone a bit.

I well remember the beautiful little woven baskets that Momma would have, especially one that hung in the bathroom to hold brushes and such. It was all pretty colors, I can still see it, blue and pink and yellow. Of course in those days, Mi'kmaw basket makers from Lennox Island would be peddling their beautiful work all over the Island. It was a common sight. I wonder what ever happened to those baskets in the old house......and imagine all those practical potato baskets that were considered essential during fall harvest. The stories they could tell!

I recall Momma telling a story of one local woman who helped pick potatoes every fall. The ground would often be frozen hard during the harvest, with 40-drill diggers still a thing of the future. Miserably hard and intense work. If you didn't get the crop in, times would be pretty tough for the winter.

This woman would crawl on her hands and knees between the drills, dragging a burlap bag to fill. She'd leave the filled bag at the end of the drill, grab another bag and start back down on the other side of the drill.

I guess it was something to watch, since she was pregnant. But after a few years of it, they stopped marvelling on how efficiently she could dig potatoes, since she was pregnant every fall, and the burlap bag wasn't the only thing she dragged.........her belly was pretty well dragging in the rut too. No doubt someone out there can relate........

And how about those sparkling blue eyes of the fish man back in the day.....I think his name was Danny Jarvis. Momma loved seeing him arrive, she always had a few dollars to get a feed of nice fish, whatever he had on board. Supper would indeed be tasty that evening! He went door to door, I suppose he had his route. Anyone who lived near a wharf, or had a fisherman in the family didn't need his services, but for folks like Momma, out in the counrtry, no car, no way really to travel, it was a terrific service. They'd have a chat, "Til next time."

Shd scrub up some potatoes, and fry up some pork fat. That pork would get rendered down in the old cast iron pan, so she'd have fat for frying the fish, and the fat itself would be cut into cubes for "cracklins" or "scrunchins" to serve over the creamy white sauce she would prepare. Oh my god, it was good. I can see it still.....

Was it healthy or nutritionally dense? That's up for debate. But she had no resources, and a meal like that once a week filled up those hungry bellies that she was responsible for.

Lloyd MacEwen was a familiar face at our door. Thank God for people like him. He was as reliable as the sun, his knock at the porch door would be followed by, "Mrs.?" and in he'd come. They'd have a quick chat and he'd say, "How many do you need?" He'd hop back out to his truck and come back in with Momma's order. Again, eggs were a staple, and still are (I love picking up my eggs these days from the Amish farm) both in baking, of course, and cooking.

Many a day we'd come in from school to the wonderful familiar smell of potatoes boiling and eggs frying gently in the pan, slowly, at the back of the woodstove. Momma would often serve mashed potatoes and hard fried eggs for our suppertime meal. A good choice, inexpensive, filling and lots of protein, which growing children need. Every now and then I still serve it, and we'll always sit back and say, "That was as good as steak!"

Lloyd's beautiful home is still at the edge of the Bear River Road, on the Main highway, and just recently the barn was torn down. He kept that property spic and span. Of course, he and his wife are long gone now.

In later years, late summer or early fall, you could bet your bottom dollar on a little truck that would roll in the drive way. The driver was John Stephen MacDonald with a load of fresh fruit from the valley. He'd amble in and we'd have a little chat. I'd say, "What have you got today, John?"

He'd answer, "Apples. McIntosh and Delicious. Pears. Some plums. Bags or boxes, if you need more." He was always pleasant, but I always thought he had such a sad face, a face that could tell a story. John and his family certainly had more than their share of hard knocks.

But to my little growing family a couple of bags of fresh fruit at a good price, delivered right to the door was a god send. There were a lot of lunches to pack!

The apple season, even now is quite short, so John returned every couple of weeks til the picking was over, and we were glad to have it. There weren't as many orchards on the Island in the 80s and 90s, like there is now, apple picking is almost like fall tourism. And the prices are outrageous, but so is the quality, and so is everything else. Those good old days are over.

Down deep in my memory, probably from a remark my grandmother might have made at one time, is a gasp of Josey Grant peddling meat. It would have made sense at the time. One of my readers might correct or inform me, I could have made it up.

Jamie spent most of his working life as a door-to-door salesman of sorts. Most of you will remember Ken Coffin and The Buttercup Dairy, a staple and most important business in Souris. Freddie had the job as the milkman first, for a short time, then passed it on to Jamie. Momma had milk delivered for years when we were kids. Parked right on Main Street, Ken kept that place gleaming, and provided a much needed service for the local dairy farmers. He processed their raw product into rich cream, whole milk, skim milk, 2% milk, buttermilk and our favorite of all time, the delicious thick creamy chocolate milk!! He packaged the milk in glass bottles first, then bags and cartons. Jamie well remembers the weight of a "milk crate" full of filled glass milk bottles. Ken also sold butter, and later on started providing yogurt on the trucks too. At about that time it was becoming a health craze, with a lot of the Island credit going to Elmer's, another local dairy up West. We all loved it.

Monday, Wednesday and Friday, that Buttercup Dairy delivery truck was in the yard. At first the householder would buy "tokens" to be set out to pay for the milk. But soon enough, the drivers carried a float to make change and cash was used. Jamie was the milkman for six years, the Coffins were good to him, and he was a good driver. Even after he left the company, we continued on with the delivery, I loved stocking up on milk, yogurt, and at strawberry time, lots of cream! It was such a treat.

But like everything else, times changed.

After that job, Jamie drove a freight truck for Danny Campbell for six years. He was the original "courier" as he drove to Charlottetown every day to pick up and deliver orders all the way to East Point. It could be an envelope, a box of goods, or a bale of barbed wire for Mossey's, delivered right to the business. It was tough job, hard on the body, and he soon moved on to continue his trucking career with Irving Oil, for over thirty years.

Those were the days of common courtesy, and attention to detail. Lots of times he had to think himself out of a problem. He always had time to be polite, and anyone who knew him soon learned to respect him, and his quiet ways. He had and still has, a lot of integrity and honesty, and always had time to have a brief chat and still stay on schedule. For him, he was a company man yes; he had to be. But he truly felt it was all about the people. And at Christmas time for many years, and after every one of our children was born, he came home every day with gifts of all description. He worked hard, and was well liked.

And of course we still have fuel home delivery, and realize it's one of the few delivery services left to us today.

As a young wife and mother, I had the great luxury of staying at home to raise our family. And lots of my friends did too. We all went into the work force at some point, and I'm glad of all the experiences I've had. And even after Momma passed away, I still looked forward to home delivery services for as long as they lasted.

Are they outdated? I guess so, sadly.

Today, I get lots of home deliveries, but they consist of a driver screeching to a halt on my gravel driveway, hopping out to throw a box on my deck. snap a picture going almost backwards, and take off. And it's rarely the same driver twice, they change every week it seems. Hard to build a relationship there.

I feel we've lost the human connection, the human-ness of some kind of contact. And at this point looking back, I feel Covid and those lock downs, as much as they may have protected us, I think caused a sort of distrust to set in. We view things more from a city dweller's perspective. Don't recognize the car or truck that just drove in? Don't let them in. Don't recognize the number on the phone? Delete it. Masks, gloves, plexi glass barriers, all made it easier to slip in and out of stores virtually undetected. How do I know?

Guilty here!