On Salem

Today I had occasion to drive through Salem as I ventured from Tanglewood to Richfield. I did some (very) early morning shopping, scoring nice bargains, before heading to visit my Great Aunt Susie at the retirement home.

I drove down East Riverside Drive. This road runs along the Roanoke River. It is not as wild-looking as it was when I was child. Then there were more trees.

My grandmother until 1992 lived across from the river in a house which still stands and remains occupied. Several of the homes have been torn down and the rest are supposed to be, I think, because they are flooded out frequently.

My grandmother's house flooded badly in 1972, during Hurricane Agnes and in 1985. It flooded one other time but I don't remember the event. Hurricane Camille, perhaps?

Anyway, the house looked much smaller than I remember. It is only about 1,000 square feet - not much for raising six children. But I have most of my fondest childhood memories storied in that house.

Grandma rocking me. Playing with superhero dolls (I was never much on girly baby dolls, I liked to play with Johnny West and GI Joe and when the superhero dolls like Wonderwoman came out, I adored those).

During the summer my grandmother would walk us up to downtown Salem. Salem them actually looked like a small town, not a junk heap like it does now (I know Salemites have great pride in their town, but honestly, looking in from the outside, it isn't what it used to be).

We'd go to Brooks Byrd Pharmacy for a snowcone. Yum. Then we'd tour Newberry's, which was a precursor to Walmart, I guess. A five and dime. It was the most delicious place, full of toys and smells. We'd spend our quarter (or 50 cents) on something like a balsam wood glider airplane (though I always liked the ones with a propeller) or a paddleball. When they started making "monster models" we all bought those and filled the basement with tiny plastic replicas of Dracula and the Wolfman.

There was a cafeteria uptown somewhere (Tarpley's, maybe? or was it Newberry's, too?) and if we were *very* good we could have pie or pudding. On the walk back, we'd stop off at various relatives and chat.

Because my grandmother's family, you see, pretty much owned a lot of Salem at one time, including the land where the hospital sits, some generations back. Or so I have been told. I don't know where the money went, but the relatives are there all over the place.

I enjoyed my drive down East Riverside Drive. I liked remembering, especially since it's not been so long since my grandmother's funeral.

It was a little like going to see her. I can almost feel her eyes on me and hear her voice calling to me in greeting, saying, "It's my granddaughter! You've made my day."