Listening

Every Friday my Mother would give my weekly allowance. $5.00 was my pay check , that was just enough to buy one full record album or a few 45's. There was a record store at Simpson Sears department store, but it wasn't as good as the Kelly's record store in New Westminster on Columbia street. So on Saturday i would scrape together all of the money i had and get on BC Hydro bus and go to Columbia Street with my buddies. We could go see a movie at either the Paramount theatre or The Columbia theatre, which had 2 theatres in it, as well as check out Kelly's. There was also the Crack a joke store we could go to. Which was alway good for a laugh. So if there wasn't any good movies, i could go and buy a full album or go to a movie and just get a 45 rpm record, either way i would never go home empty handed. Saving up money was not what a cool kid would do, you had to spend it. Over time, my collection would grow and still continues to grow. I never got rid of my records, i ended up getting other peoples collections in the 1990's when the cd's came along and it seemed that everyone wanted to unload all those heavy scratchy vinyls that just took up space. Two years ago, suddenly vinyl records came back and stores started selling them at high prices. I even had one of my cd's that i recorded, Graeme Emmott "The outer reaches of inner space" pressed in purple vinyl. I have 4 turntables throughout my house, one in the garage, one in the living room, one in the kitchen and one in the basement . When i listen to one of the records i bought with my allowance money, i am glad i didn't waste it candy or chips, i could always hit my mom up for that stuff.