{"id":7116,"date":"2020-12-24T08:26:28","date_gmt":"2020-12-24T13:26:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=7116"},"modified":"2020-12-24T08:33:35","modified_gmt":"2020-12-24T13:33:35","slug":"episode-204-ttc-auction-of-lost-articles-and-red-skeoch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=7116","title":{"rendered":"EPISODE 204 TTC AUCTION OF LOST ARTICLES and RED SKEOCH"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

<\/div>\n
EPISODE 204    TTC LOST ARTICLES  AUCTION SALE<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Dec. 2020<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Dad did  not buy presents.  Well, not quite true, one year he bought Eric  and me<\/div>\n
a Red Rider BB gun and a long-playing portable record player.  We got them <\/div>\n
unwrapped and later discovered he was  able to persuade some store to sell<\/div>\n
them if he put a dollar downpayment.  The rest of the costs was up to us\u2026actually<\/div>\n
up to mom as usual.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
That probably sounds terrible to readers who had a more normal family if such<\/div>\n
ever really existed.   We took it in our stride.  You already know that the BB gun<\/div>\n
only existed  for 1 day and  was then smashed against the Manitoba  Maple tree<\/div>\n
in our backyard to the relief of us  all.  We sat the records player on the cedar<\/div>\n
chest in the only bedroom in our house.  We had a nice stack  of old 78 rpm records<\/div>\n
to feed the machine.  These also only lasted  a short time.  Eric sat on them\u2026smashed<\/div>\n
them all to hell.  Or maybe I sat on them.  Forget who but remember the shards<\/div>\n
of broken records.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
No one ever bought mom a  Christmas  present.  Never occurred to us.  She wrapped<\/div>\n
presents  for us though which  was expected.  One year she got upset at this<\/div>\n
one way  gift giving. \u201cDoes  no one ever buy a gift for me?\u201d  That made Eric and<\/div>\n
I suddenly think about reciprocal  giving and  we tore up to the furniture store<\/div>\n
and bought her an electric table lamp with a base full of curves.  She was touched.<\/div>\n
Put the lamp on the little  table beside her bed couch in the living room.  Rather garish<\/div>\n
but she treasured it.  We felt justified in taking her gifts after that.  I think it cost<\/div>\n
Eric  and I about $7\u2026.all our spare cash from the Toronto Star paper route which<\/div>\n
paid us  half a cent per 3 cent paper.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
No one really felt bad about this one way gift giving.  Even mom was  not disturbed except that one time.  Our big Christmas presents<\/div>\n
for a couple of years was  the TTC lost goods auction sale at a run down store on Queen Street West.  All year long<\/div>\n
the TTC  conductors  turned in lost articles to the transport officials.  Piles of them.  Then, sometime around<\/div>\n
mid  December, the unclaimed  articles were dumped into huge cardboard boxes and auctioned off to whoever<\/div>\n
attended the auction.  <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Dad, Eric and  I were enthusiastic bidders.  Limited funds though.  But eventually we were able to get a big box<\/div>\n
of things nobody wanted.   We kept the box closed until Christmas Eve or near that day.   Then dad  sat on the<\/div>\n
couch that mom slept on\u2026adjusted  his glasses\u2026and opened  the box.  The box was so big that it would fit<\/div>\n
a kitchen sink.  This was no tiny box holding a pair of socks.   This  was an immense box  of lost articles.<\/div>\n
A Treasure trove.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
What do you suppose people forget on the streetcar?   Take a guess.  You are right.  There were usually a<\/div>\n
few umbrellas\u2026some working, others bent so badly they would  not unfurl.  The umbrellas were the first<\/div>\n
thing pulled from the box.   Dad looked up\u2026amused with each treasure.  Then there were gloves\u2026lots<\/div>\n
of gloves.  Most of them female.  Some in pairs\u2026others singles. \u201cThese are for you Methusalum.\u201d And mom<\/div>\n
began to collect a pile of gloves.   Next were the scarves.  Again most of them were women\u2019s apparel but<\/div>\n
a few were suitable for Dad.  He wrapped them around his  neck.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
In this  picture, however, Dad  had reached the near bottom of the box and he pulled  out a pair of<\/div>\n
pants.   How could anyone lose their pants in the street car?  \u201cSomeone got off the street with his<\/div>\n
bare ass to the wind,\u201d said Dad  with his amused expression.  Deadpan expression. Not laughing out loud but an  expression<\/div>\n
that made the rest of us howl.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
There were other things\u2026empty purses,  wallets,  hats\u2026but that pair of pants took the cake that<\/div>\n
one year.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
A lot of  Christmases  have gone by now.  Lots of  presents have been exchanged.  Sometimes<\/div>\n
the pile of presents make the Christmas tree seem  small.   Some great presents.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
But to my mind this Christmas  of  the year 2020 could never compare with the Christmas<\/div>\n
of 1953 or 1954 when Dad, Eric and I hauled that huge five or ten dollar box of umbrellas<\/div>\n
and mismatched socks home to 455 Annette Street on the TTC streetcar and trolley bus.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Mom got most of the stuff\u2026gloves, scarves, purses.   But dad got the pants which he never <\/div>\n
wore but held  up for us to see.   We could imagine some poor sucker getting  off the<\/div>\n
streetcar with his \u201cbare ass to the wind\u201d as dad said in his usual colourful language.<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Dec. 24, 2020<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

EPISODE 204    TTC LOST ARTICLES  AUCTION SALE alan skeoch Dec. 2020 Dad did  not buy presents.  Well, not quite true, one year he bought Eric  and me a Red Rider BB gun and a long-playing portable record player.  We got them  unwrapped and later discovered he was  able to persuade some store to sell […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7116\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}