A Day at the ZOO
July 30th 2026
For 90 years now, I have been experiencing and enjoying life as it has been presented in its many forms. At first, I had to learn as we all must, a few rules either taught to me by my parents and teachers or just by living and learning through trial and error. Teachers, by natural instinct, thought I was a terrible student as I was bored in the classroom, but stimulated by the activities that were around me. Few teachers looked upon a child like me as a challenge. To interest the young craving brain with real challenges was not on the curriculum. That only comes about in home school teaching but rarely in the public-school arena. So, half way through my grade ten year when my father wanted to remove me from school to help with the home finances, I informed my math teacher I was quitting school. He encouraged me to do so, it was a decision that I was reluctant to make on my own. For me, leaving the security of student life and entering the world of full-time employment was stimulating, exciting, exhilarating and scarry.
The mid 50’s were quite different than today. I was born in the latter years of the depression and that had a great impact on my years going forward. Even today, my mental attitude is still one of “save a penny, earn a penny.” Pennies are long gone from our lives but I am still aware of the old days and fear they may return. When looking back, my fondest memories are of how simple life was. We were not overly worried about having our house invaded or broken into. Many in the rural areas of Ontario, and most of southern Ontario was rural, we did not even have locks on our doors. This changed rather quickly and by the early 60’s, the small-town hardware stores were selling many more door locks than ever before. I purchased my first new car in 1956. It was the only car on the V.W. lot. It was a green Bug and the dealer was out of inventory when I drove off the lot. Looking back at movies of the 60’s-70’s and 80’s Volkswagens were everywhere. That car cost me $1,500.00. My 1953 Chevrolet, used, cost me $1,200.00. in 1954. I am currently driving two cars that to replace them with current models, would cost me well over $125,000.00. Mind-blowing!
Bathrooms –
This may seem like an unlikely subject to explore, however, this mind of mine does wander off in many directions and I am in a bathroom kind of mindset. We have three bathrooms in our house and for two people that seems a little extravagant. I can remember living in a house with no bathrooms. For the younger readers, this seems a bit of a stretch. Where did you brush your teeth, or take a bath or a basic wash, how’s about the most important use of a bathroom, the toilet? All good questions. We made do!
Now keep in mind, my experience was at my grandparent’s summer cottage on the north shore of Lake Simcoe. We had a backhouse for the essentials and the lake, as cold as it was in the off season for all the other toilet essentials. Before leaving my family and well into our married life, one bathroom in the home was the norm. As with society on the whole, we take a good thing and make it obscene by always trying to improve on it. The bathrooms of today are a perfect example. The bigger, the better, marble wall to wall and the heated floor also. Two sinks are a minimum and a shower big enough to accommodate the local football team. Shower heads are numerous and expensive. A week-end visit to an exclusive spa would be cheaper. A bidet is the new trend from Europe but rarely used. Bathtubs have done the full circle from the old oak, copper, galvanized or tin oval tubs that were pulled out to the middle of the Livingroom to an oval porcelain facsimile placed unseemly in front of a bay window. My needs are not of this era; I like my bathroom the way it is. Small and intimate with lots of grab bars. I will not be written up as death by falling on a stone floor and hitting my noggin on one of many bathroom appliances. My walls are too close to allow me to fall down and while it’s not the Taj Ma-hal, it is safer. Ballroom size bathrooms are nice to look at but very expensive and not practical. Well advised will put the extra savings on a custom bathroom, into a custom kitchen. I’m a kitchen guy.
Paul D. Scott rantingsandraves.com