Small Town Sunday

Living a hour outside a major city has its advantages: you don't have to deal with excessive traffic, you see a few more stars, and you're just close enough that if you feel so inclined to go out and have fun, it's not that difficult. But being fifteen or sixteen in this same town was miserable. There was "nothing to do" every weekend, and my friends and I had to get creative. Yesterday my BFF and I had a nostalgic day. Sleeping in late from a party-hard Saturday night, I got up and met her at the local dinner. Five dollars for a huge omlette? Uh, yes please. We chowed down, then proceeded to spend two hours just talking. Yup, this was a typical weekend in high school. Though admittedly, we probably would have arrived at said diner a lot later than we did this weekend, and stayed later, most likely drinking a pot and a half of coffee, being loud, and checking out the other tables. There would be glares from other patrons.

But then after that, we headed off to Q-Mart. Ah, Q-Mart: small town paradise for the weird and out of place. Think of a flea market meets knock off goods meets a Made-in- China mumbo jumble of things. It reminds me of "Portobello Road" from Bedknobs and Broomsticks, with a lot more pickup trucks and missing teeth.

But it's one of the few places we can still find nickel candy and candy cigarettes, sorts Runts and chewing gum we know is illegal for its addictive properties. There's leather shops, furniture stores, jewelry, meat counters, and, our favorite, the ice cream stand with real Hershey's Cotton Candy ice cream. It's a little scoop of ecstasy. Oh! And just about everything here is cash only. It's the perfect palce to budget: you enter with ten bucks, and anything that costs over that, you're not buying. Hence why most things you find there are never more than six or seven dollars.

Sure, the shopping is good, but the people watching is even better. Hipsters, grandmas with bumper stickers on their walkers, guys with really big speakers in a super tint car… you find everyone at Q-Mart. It's pretty amazing. Not bad for a small-town Sunday!