Family Remedies

A few days ago I was watching a re-run of "The Golden Girls". (Yes, we are snowbound here, and the episode just caught my fancy!) It featured a character who was a pharmacist in a small drugstore, and it highlighted very briefly his wider role in helping his customers with health care. That started my thinking about how rare small, independent pharmacies are nowadays. We all take our prescriptions to CVS or Osco or Walgreens or Rite Aid or Walmart, and, while the pharmacists are always helpful, we don't have any kind of on-going relationship with them. They don't know us. I usually even go to the drive-through outside.

 How do the 'little guys' stay in business? I imagine some have ventured into the specialized prescriptions markets, where they make customized, specific medications for particular, rare cases. Some probably hang on by providing just that high-quality, personal service they always have, even in changing neighborhoods.

I am pleased to report that the neighborhood pharmacy my parents used while we were growing up still occupies the same spot and still provides high-quality personal service to its customers.How do I know this? I visit at least once a year when I am in Portsmouth.

The pharmacy is called Suburban Pharmacy and sits on Rodman Avenue in the Westhaven area. (This was once suburban Portsmouth!) When I was a child, there was also a soda fountain in the store, complete with the real Coca-Cola served up in a glass by a soda jerk. (There might have been other things available, but Cokes were all we ever bought there!) My mother would put my baby brother and my sister in our beautiful red Radio Flyer wagon and I would walk beside her as we made our exciting pilgrimage several blocks to Suburban. We were usually pretty warm by the time we arrived, and I well remember how cool and shady the air conditioned pharmacy felt. We would leave the wagon outside and hop up on the stools at the fountain counter. For 20 cents all four of us could have our own icy, delicious Co-Cola. What a treat!!

At other, less happy times, of course, my parents filled all those prescriptions so necessary to fight our childhood illnesses. We kept the pharmacists busy for quite a few years. Even when we moved across the river to Churchland, we still filled prescriptions at Suburban, although there came a time when we switched to our nearby independent Churchland Pharmacy. (Interestingly, this also had a soda fountain, well into the 1970s.)

But I haven't filled prescriptions at Suburban in 40 years. Why in the world do I visit it when I'm in town?

S.T. 37.

This is not a code or a password. I have not been abducted by aliens. S.T. 37 is the brand name of a genuine liquid antiseptic that the Harrison family has used for more than 100 years. It is our family's tried and true healing agent, good for all sorts of scrapes and burns and wounds and sore throats. It really is good in any situation where you want to prevent infections. My Grandmother Harrison used it on everyone in her family, including the goats! (More on that in a moment.) I keep a bottle in my medicine cabinet all the time. When each of my children went off to college, I sent along a bottle of S.T. 37 and some Band Aids. Now that each child is established and living independently, I try to make sure there is S.T. 37 in the house. (That reminds me--I need to be sure there is a bottle nearby for the twins.) I took along a bottle when we went to Princeton last year for our sabbatical. S.T. 37 is a colorless, liquid antiseptic that doesn't stain, isn't greasy, and has a pleasant taste if you need to use it for mouth care. We used it for every injury or infection, and it's a blessed relief to sunburn. I swear by it.

And that's why I visit Suburban Pharmacy. It's the only place we can still find S.T. 37 on the shelves. Usually there are two bottles, and I buy them both! My sister still does the same, and my brother as well. Although it is now possible to order S.T. 37 from Amazon (!), I try to patronize Suburban Pharmacy as often as I can to encourage their stock of S.T. 37. Since I grew up with the owner and pharmacist, I also like to say hello when I'm clearing out their supply of S.T. 37. I'm due to replenish my supply the next time I'm in Portsmouth.

Now, the goat story. My father's family owned two goats when living in the Oakwood area of Raleigh. They were named Nanny and Billy. My grandfather had made a wonderful see-saw/merry-go-round device for his children in the backyard of the property, and this fascinated the goats. Once, Nanny walked too far up one arm of the see-saw, and when it began to tilt in the opposite direction, her hoof was caught between a metal washer and the wood. She suffered a nasty cut on her little hoof. My grandmother scooped her up and took her in the house, where she bathed the cut, dried it, poured S.T.37 on it, and bandaged it.  She repeated this for several days. My father told us that after a week, the cut healed completely. You can see why we children were so impressed with S.T. 37 and why we wanted it applied to every hurt we had! (Nanny stayed away from the see-saw from thence forward.)

When I need to use S.T. 37, I like to think that my grandmother used it for her family the same way that my parents used it for our family the same way I used it for my family. And if you ever nick yourself or scrape your knee when you're visiting me, I will use S.T. 37 on you! Guaranteed cure.