Common Cents

Posted on February 20, 2013 under Storytelling with 4 comments

The Canadian penny has been on the endangered species list for some time and now has been rendered extinct.  As we move faster towards a cashless society, the humble copper coin will no longer clutter up our pockets and sit haplessly in tins and jars for years on end.  Despite the fact that it had become more trouble than it was worth, the penny stored value far above its face amount.  Are we in the midst of a common cents revolution?

There was a day that a penny was worth, well, a penny.  And it was a status symbol.  I know that I am dating myself but back in the sixties, the coolest kids at school wore penny loafers. Strutting down the halls of the school, with a carefully placed penny wedged into the front top of your loafers, attracted attention.  It never translated into any dates for me. Apparently, the shoes weren’t cool enough.  The only cure for nerdiness as a teenager is adulthood.

And of course, who can forget penny candy.  Back then the confectionery store was the beating heart of Main Street in small town Canada.  Ten pennies could buy you enough candies to make your glycemic index roar through the stratosphere.  On a good day, you could get five candies for a single penny.  Now that’s value.  Imagine heading off to school with raging hormones… and fifty pieces of candy.  And you think there are discipline problems in schools today!

Young teenage boys and girls have different tastes and, surprisingly, this carries on into adulthood.  Ask any boy back then what he spent his money on in the candy store and the list would probably start with black licorice pipes.  This was a bad thing to consume during Lent when we were forbidden to eat candy.  It was a dead giveaway when you showed up at home with the evidence smeared across your lips.  Next on the list were candy cigarettes.  You can see that boys already had a predilection for vices.

The girls preferred candy necklaces and rolls of Sweethearts that contained love messages.  Young women could find romance just about anywhere, including the candy store.  In later years their taste in necklaces would become far more expensive.  Most love messages no longer arrive in person or by mail; Facebook and Twitter are the new matchmakers.

There was one enterprising businessman who was well ahead of the curve.  He operated a bottle exchange and a candy store under the same roof.  After scouring through ditches, you would accumulate enough bottles for a trip to Pete’s.  Once you received your three cents for the bottles, you would immediately reinvest the proceeds in candy.  Pete had you coming and going.

Of course, as time wore on, inflation kicked in and candy became expensive.  But you could still get a lot of nourishment for a quarter… like a Joe Louis and a coke.  Talk about a balanced diet!

No longer can we ask you for a “penny for your thoughts”.  And when I go to the convenience store these days, what will I put in the little plastic cup that once housed “give a penny/take a penny”, a measure of Canadian gentility and civility?  Maybe I’ll leave a note to say farewell to the one cent piece.

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