FlutteringBy

If your day ever needs a re-set, or if you just need to take a break and lose yourself for a while, grab a friend and head to the corner antique shop on your lunch break! My dad and I took a step back in time yesterday with a quick lunch at the Woolworth Diner, then a tour of the store’s three floors full of antique gems. It was a great way to turn things around!

The morning had started out a little bumpy, with talk of bad dreams and sad times. But our plan was to meet up for lunch and turn the day around…and the Woolworth Antique Mall was just the place.

I was never a real antique aficionado, but today’s excursion was special because it was a chance to kick around a bit with Dad, and also because it felt a little like “this is your life.” But, first…what the heck? This place was full of items I’m certain cannot be antiques! Are they? Am I? Regardless, it sure was fun to see so many things straight from my childhood…like the orange cast iron mandolin and violin wall hangings just like the set we had hanging on our kitchen wall; miniature dolls of Mom and Pop Walton (with the original $2.99 Pic N Save price tag still attached); and there were all kinds of metal lunch boxes (no purple Donny Osmond one, though…I’d have bought that).

The real fun was exploring with my dad all the items that were not familiar to me. He’s got a few years on me, so he was able to school me on some of the treasures. My favorite find was the upright steamer trunk with drawers and a place for hanging clothes back in the day of the Titanic. We agreed the filled trunk would weigh a ton, but we also agreed the owners probably didn’t have to worry about carrying it themselves. Then we came across a cache of Civil Defense ration biscuits, produced in 1964 for storage in fallout shelters in case a nuclear war caused the masses to seek refuge. The biscuits aren’t for sale, and I definitely didn’t want one, but I’d sure like to see them! Trying on fancy hats that fancy ladies must have worn was fun, too…I could definitely get into the hat thing (but evidently they made heads smaller back then because most didn’t seem to fit me!).

Our field trip to the antique shop was a great time for daydreaming, rounding up some fun, and for turning the day around. In the end, it was a pretty good day after all.