Our Corner Store

For some parents but more grandparents, the contents of the 23 free verse poems in Our Corner Store will be a reminder of a time now past. For present day children, Heidbreder’s book will be an introduction to a time period when the proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child”, was more actual in terms of the “village” than metaphorical. The plural possessive pronoun in the book’s title is most important to a child reader’s understanding of Our Corner Store. Today, if children should actually participate in their family’s grocery shopping, the whole family probably drives to a large mall to shop in a store belonging to a national grocery chain. Going up and down the aisles to make their selections, these contemporary shoppers need not speak to another person outside the family, even at the point of paying for their purchases if the store offers self-checkout.

In the days of Heidbreder’s Our Corner Store, families owning cars were significantly fewer, and consequently a family’s grocery shopping largely took place in a mom-and-pop store, one that was within walking distance. These small family-owned and run neighborhood businesses knew their customers at a personal level. And so, through the eyes of two unnamed children, readers meet Mr. and Mrs. Stanstones who, along with their butcher Bert, operate the neighborhood corner grocery store with the four-legged assistance of Tobias C. Cat, aka Toby, who is unofficially in charge of vermin control. Timewise, the poems’ contents begin in the fall and span almost a full year. With grocery lists provided by their mother, the siblings, a sister and brother, are regularly sent to Stanstones’ by themselves to make the necessary purchases. Sometimes they carry cash with them, but, at other times in this pre-credit card era they get to say:

“Charge it! Charge it!”
We love these words,
think they’re some
of the funniest we’ve ever heard.

We don’t need money
only the funny words
to fill the lists we carry. (From Charge It, p. 19)

However, the children’s interactions with the adults at Stanstones’ are more than just commercial transactions. In many ways, the store’s three adults become quasi-surrogate parents or grandparents who engage in various hijinks and play with the children. For example, in “The Big Freezer”, when butcher Bert finally accedes to the siblings’ repeated request to be allowed to accompany him into the walk-in meat cooler, the meat hanging from hooks actually spooks the children, but in a deliciously delightful way. Stanstones’ has a comic book section, with the comics being displayed on spinners. The children acknowledge, “...we don’t buy many. / They cost too much money.”

“But it’s okay,
since many days
Mrs. Stanstones lets us choose one,
squat behind the front counter,
turn the picture pages
and work to read the hard words.
Toby nudges in and purrs.

If Mrs. Stanstones is free,
she’ll grab a stool or chair
and read along with us,
making the hard words easier. (From Comic Books, p. 55)

And Mrs. Stanstones’ generosity doesn’t stop at the in-store reading. “...we get to borrow one / to share with Mom and Dad.” Stanstones’ is also where the children redeem the pop bottles they have found discarded in the neighborhood and the place where they drool over the “big,wide – cookie pancakes” stored in glass jars on the counter. And

Around Christmas time every year
new jars suddenly appear
next to the cookies,
rainbowed with candies: (From The Candy Jars, p. 40)

The candies’ seasonal appearance sends the children running for home where they raid their piggy banks so that they can go:

Back to the store
to buy as much candy as we can
(Or as much as Mrs. Stanstones
will let us buy
with her quick eagle eye!). (From The Candy Jars, p. 41)

The children’s attachment to their corner store and those who operate it is such that in “Jake” they stop a new friend from shoplifting. As well, via “Saturdays”, readers learn that every Saturday after supper the two head to Stanstones’ “to help close up the store” which will then remain shut until Monday morning.

In “The Grand Opening” (pp. 42-43), Heidbreder foreshadows the fate of not just Stanstones’ but most mom-and-pop stores.

We all pile into the car
for the spring “GRAND OPENING”
of a brand-new “Super Market!”

Readers get to experience this store through the children’s eyes, and they are overwhelmed by its size, get separated from their parents, and ultimately, “We all leave, / without buying anything / at the ‘GRAND OPENING.’”

Though Our Corner Store was chronologically published after Rooster Summer, the majority of its events actually take place before those in Rooster Summer. In the poem “Closing” (pp. 58-60), readers learn:

Home from our farm-summer holiday,
we bounce down to Stanstones’
straight away,
itching to see Bert, Toby,
Mrs. Stanstones and Mrs. Stanstones,
and to tell them about
our new summertime kitten.

As the poem continues, Heidbreder reveals that the Stanstones had made the decision to close the store some months earlier, information they had shared with the children’s parents who, in turn, decided:

“...they wanted to wait
until you got back.
They didn’t want you to feel sad
while you were away on holiday.”

Chelsea O’Byrne’s bright gouache and colored pencil illustrations are distributed throughout the book’s pages, but they are more decorative than functional, and only one or two really reflect the period in which the poems’ events would have occurred.

Heidbreder closes Our Corner Store> with “Then” in which he speaks to the freedom he and his sister enjoyed during their childhood.

We could explore, make mistakes, find friends, grow in our own way and live outside our small family. We were free to roam.

This freedom, Heidbreder acknowledges, “couldn’t have happened without the trust of our parents” and their parents’ recognition that: “You’re wild cards, free to roam, / with not just one, but many a home.”

Today’s readers of Our Corner Store may find themselves envying and wishing for the freedom that their parents and grandparents enjoyed during these earlier times.