The other day, I popped into Woodgreen Discount Drugs at the corner of Queen and Logan. The customers, many thin with wide, startled eyes, had the appearance of people who truly needed both drugs and discounts.
Beneath harsh, practical lighting that cast a kind of green pall over everything, I wandered around looking for an antacid. The place is open, with no aisles, and it has an almost vacant feeling to it. The pharmaceutical counter is pushed to the back of the store, and the walls are lined with dusty, old-fashioned display counters with illuminated signs above them, reading things like, “Cold Medication” or “First Aid.” The place has a weird, kind of accidentally retro feel to it, and it carried with it an antique sense of institutional pride that made me think of the 1950’s.
I wandered in circles for a bit, trying to find what I was looking for, before the woman working behind the front cash, asked if she could help me. She was probably about 60, and had long, colourless hair and the stained, boney fingers of a smoker.
And so I ambled about with her for a stretch, as we looked in all the obvious spots, before she found out from the preoccupied pharmacist’s– who clearly didn’t want to be disturbed– the secret location of the antacid. I was extremely grateful, and as she handed me the medication, she piped up in the spirited, instructional tone of a parent, “ See now, you should always speak up and ask for what you need!” She looked extremely pleased with herself to be so much help, and I couldn’t help but worry that was a feeling she didn’t get nearly enough of in her life.