Every year, about six weeks before Christmas, the folks would stock a toy assortment for customers to purchase for gifts for their children. The assortment came in a box about the size of a peach crate, and was displayed on top of the counter for people to look through. There were Big Little Books, coloring books, toy cars and airplanes, tractors & wagons, toy guns, little dolls, magic slates, whistles and kazoos. Most items were priced in the ten to twenty-five cent range, and most items sold by Christmas time. I would usually end up with one or maybe two items from the box of wonders for my Christmas present.
When I was perhaps four or so, I snooped in the closet where Mom would hide gifts she had purchased in Sioux Falls or Madison. There was a beautiful red box, with a fierce dragon on the lid, that contained a small set of dominos hid away on a shelf in the closet. One day when I must have been quite bored, I had said to Mom that it sure would be fun to play with some dominos if only we had some. She could read me like a book and knew that I had been snooping in the closet. I got quite a lecture and was told that the dominos were going to be my Christmas present, but now that I knew about them she couldn’t give them to me. She said she would just have to give them to Lyle instead.
I am sure they were intended for Lyle’s present in the first place but she wanted me to know it didn’t pay to snoop, especially just before Christmas. I don’t remember what I got that year, but it was not a set of dominos with a dragon on the box. And I’m not too sure Lyle would let me play with them either, without him being there too.
Don’t feel too sorry for me though. I’m sure I got more than my share of toys and playthings while we were at Center.
-o0o-