Above is the paper box at the end of my parents' driveway, after one of our recent snowstorms.Below is the paper box from Miss Pookie's house.
Paper boxes have special significance because they remind me of my paternal grandmother. She walked every day of her life, very early in the morning. Since she was already out and about, she'd take people's paper out of the box and deliver them to their door.At the time, we couldn't get paper boxes at the end of our driveway, they were all collectively located at the end of the lane or "state road" (meaning a road maintained by the state, assigned a route number), so this saved the neighbors the bother of having to drive or walk to the end of the lane to retrieve their daily news. In addition to delivering the printed word, she was able to visit with the neighbors who happened to be awake at that hour, and she'd dispatch any relevant neighborly news. It was a win-win for everybody.
Recently a dear friend of mine said something about going to get the paper out the can. (An actual can, not the bathroom.) And it made me remember that before plastic paper boxes there were round cans, sometimes rusty round cans, just big enough to hold a rolled-up paper. I haven't seen one of those anywhere in decades.
Who else remembers
11 comments:
I guess grandma was the social network of her times.
I think I meant social media of her time.
I don't remember the cans. But then, I grew up in Suburbia and we had boys riding by on bikes who would throw the paper towards the front door.
We had a can! And an indoor one too! Some places in Tennessee were so advanced back in my day;)
Living my whole life in a big city as a kid I went to the corner kiosk/newspaper stand on Sunday morning to get the newspapers .. durimg the week Dad bought his on the way to the office. Today we get the paper delivered to our lobby ... I didnt blog about it but once but we did have a delivery problem all summer .. but now there's a new delivery person and even on Friday during the worst of the snow storm the Times still got delivered ..
The (Can) held up a whole lot better that the plastic ones, when you hit them at 50 mph. in a truck. MM
Riding to school on dinosaurs: *snort*
We had two paper boxes, I think - one for the daily and one for the weekly.
Now, a guy just drives thru the 'hood and throws it at the end of the driveway. It's OK though - he usually double-bags and is careful when it's rainy.
i don't remember cans.. or round rusty things.. but I do remember my neighbor up the road who got the paper and on Saturday's I would wait for her window shade to be raised half way so that I knew she was awake and go get that paper out of the box for her and she would invite me in for a visit a coco-cola and a little debbie snack cake. Neither of those things ever tasted so good as they did there in that little kitchen discussing the weeks activities with that lovely neighbor of mine.
We didn't have cans in Missouri that I remember. Your grandma must have been a lot of fun!
We never had those. The paper was thrown on the drive-way. But then again, everyone had a concrete driveway that was only 50 ft long.
Never heard of the paper can, but the can yes, and the john. And we didnt ride to school, we had to walk but I will spare you the 20 miles each way in the snow story!
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