On The Other Side Of The Looking Glass

Everybody was smart and that's why drug-addiction was pretty-much unheard of. When we were little the closest graphic demonstration of what drugs would do (to you) was a depiction of Chinese addicts in an opium den. Those who weren't dead were on the way. New arrivals smoked pipes barely visible through a heavy haze. Sallow cheeked veterans of smoking were seen in droopy positions staring vacuously through sunken eyes riveted on the viewer on the other side of the picture. There wasn't much of a rush to imitate these guaranteed corpses-to-be.

When we heard the word "drugs" it was equated with medicine. And medicine was for people who were sick and didn't feel good.

Every house around our way had a medicine cabinet in the bathroom. It set in the wall over the sink and was out of reach of small children. The face of the door doubled as a mirror. You could look at yourself and wonder where it all went wrong, or why. When you opened the door, you could be sure it wasn't the same as opening the one on the ice-box or the larder.

If the shelves were well stocked, you were in a house well prepared. I'll make some notes.

Black Salve. Feels like tar with sand in it. Used to draw splinters and maybe other things from under the skin. If you put enough on your belly it might pull your appendix or gall-bladder out. That's conjecture.

Father John's Medicine. His picture is on the label. He looks like a pompous theologian. He's got to be rich from the sales. Is he under vows of poverty?

Doan's Pills. They weren't for me and I wasn't interested. Maybe they were for Doan.

Iodine and Mercurochrome. If I got a cut on my hand iodine would be applied followed by screams. Mercurochrome was for adults only. That's because it didn't sting.

Vaseline. Good for chaffed skin or lips and enemas.

Vicks. Put on the chest for chest colds, in boiling water for head colds, up the nose for clogged nasal passages. Look at the finger tracks in the jar.

Cotton Swabs. For ear aches.

Mustorole. For chest colds. Faster than Vicks and certain to cause first degree burns. This could take your attention away from what you thought was the misery of colds.

Aspirin. For unbearable headaches only.

Eye Wash. Better to get foreign objects out than Black Salve.

Calamine Lotion. For poison ivy, in our neighborhood sometimes called poison ivory. It works.

Dr. Lyons Tooth Cleaning Powder. More expensive than baking soda and it was in a tin container that could be placed on the sink.

Hair Tonic. We all had hair but this was for men and boys.

Dad's razor, razor blades and soap mug and brush. Toilet paper was nearby for hemorrhaging cuts.

Cod Liver Oil. A health elixir that kids shouldn't like. Mom bought it <@145>til I acquired a taste for it then it disappeared from the shelf. Perhaps she thought I would acquire an addiction, guzzling bottles in the alley in later life.

Castor Oil. Used only in extremis. Prunes gave us get-up and go. Impossible to acquire a taste for what ails you. Benito Mussolini, excoriated by rights activists when he spoon fed it to political malcontents, noted "it works for me."

Kay-o-pectate. Antidote for Castor Oil or prune excess.

Lydia Pinkhams was kept elsewhere. Touted as a change of life vegetable extract for women. I took a sniff out of the bottle and almost passed out. Beyond the odor was a drink stronger than a high-ball or Slo-gin. That stuff was booze without a liquor tax.

All Cough medicine. Deliberately foul tasting to thwart a temptation of over-use, probably because codeine was present.

Well, there you are. A chest full of stuff no-one really wanted to use unless they had to kept us wary. Once in a while a prescription bottle was seen. Whatever pills were in there were for whoever was really sick and no-one thought of cheating them out of what was their misfortune to take.

When we were kids medicine was viewed as not much better than toadstools.