Door to Door Salesman

     While waiting for the light to change at the corner of War Memorial and Sheridan Road, I noticed the big flag at Great American Insurance and glanced to my right and noticed an insurance agency and my mind went hopscotching down memory lane.  It reminded me of when the Prudential Insurance Agent would come to the house each month and collect on Vern's Family Policy.  That made me think of  other people who would come to the house as part of 'their route'.
     My parents had Prudential Insurance and they sent around their Insurance Man to sell us a policy when we were married just a couple of months.  He would come in the evening, as we both worked during the day.  I vaguely remember the Agent coming to the house on Maxwell Road, adding a new name to the family plan each year!
      We had two house and car insurance agents in all the years of our marriage.  Al somebody, who was an agent who lived in Farmington, he was a friend of Harold Heimbaugh, who built our house on Maxwell Road and then for many years Ed Murray, our friend in Washington.  Kind of an interesting story.  We had moved to Washington, Al was still our agent and we would see him once a year.  The year I was forty, I was listed in three auto accidents.  No. 1, was that I had cut the corner too close coming away from Church, and scratched someones car's fender, No. 2, I crossed Route 24 at Spring Creek Road and did not see an oncoming car.  I really don't know where that car came from but I felt really bad because it was a brand new car and they were leaving the next day on vacation. and No. 3, Mary was just learning to drive and went to back the car out of the barn - that's where we parked then - and hit the barn door and knocked it down.  There was damage to the taillight and bumper. I took the blame as she didn't have her license.  Al came out.  I remember him sitting at the picnic table in the back yard, smoking a cigarette and painfully telling me that the company was cancelling our insurance because statistics showed that women in their forties were more prone to accidents because that is when they started drinking heavily.  Honestly, that is what he said.  Ed Murray and his companies didn't care if I was an alcoholic or not!!!  When I moved to Peoria and Ed retired, I switched to someone here in town.
     The milkman.  When we were kids on the South side, our milkman was Chuck Florey who worked for Schierers Dairy.  I remember how while he was delivering milk, we siblings  would reach in the back of the truck for small chunks of ice to suck on or throw at each other.  When Leah was born and we lived West of Peoria, just past Bellevue, Harold Stafford was the route person for his family dairy.  What a dear man he was.  The front door was always unlocked and he would bring the milk in and put it in the fridge.  I was usually bathing a baby when he came.  He thought those little girls were something.  He had a son with a blood disorder, his wife had died from the same disease.   Years later, when Vern and one of the daughters was buying a car, Harold was working at a dealership.  Milk delivery stopped when Milk Stores became popular.  Staffords and Schierers both had stores locally.  I noticed a metal milk carrier in the basement the other day.
     When we lived on the Southside, we had people come to sell portraits in your home, meat - never bought any of that, vegetables - we grew our own and, of course, the neighbor kids selling candy, Holy Childhood Stamps, etc. - I'm still open to neighbor kids selling magazines or Cub Scout popcorn.
     One time a man - very Arab looking - came to the door selling bed spreads.  Ugly, light weight, cheap looking, blue and gold ones with gold fringe.  He knocked on the door and one of the daughters opened it and invited him in.  The bed spreads weren't exactly my taste and I slowly tried to walk him back out the door.  The spreads were ten dollars a piece and I thanked him but said:  "No, not interested".  By this time, all six of the daughters were gathered around the dining room table, they thought the spreads were beautiful - and said so.  He started in telling me he was from the Middle East and he sent the money he earned back to his family. I thanked him, but told him: "Not interested"!  Then he began to tell me that the money went to buy milk for his family and he missed his family so much - really laying it on thick.  Well, by this time our little girls were in tears and started telling me that I should buy from him to buy milk for his family.  I told him, I didn't have any cash in the house and he said he would take a check.  "Give him a check, Mama, so he can buy milk for his children", the daughters were hiccuping sadly.  So I did!  For some God awful reason, I bought two of them.  $20.00.  The children were delighted, Vern was not.  He told all our friends, and I was the butt of a lot of jokes for being made a fool of.  I got my revenge - of a sort.  We had a New Years Eve party that year and after every one had arrived, I went upstairs and put on my new caftan that I had made from part of one of the bedspreads and wore it at the party.  As I remember it started to unravel before the night was over.  Lots of laughter.
     Door to door salesman,  times have changed.