Descent into Booger County

Every 4th Friday I must make the journey into Ava to pick up our groceries and run a few errands. I've always heard people refer to that area as "Booger County", assuming that it's because it's sort of out of the way and you could hide yourself, a meth lab, or a dead body in the Ozark Hills pretty easily-don't worry, I'm not considering knocking off anyone. There's a couple of intentional communities, as well. I've been told that "East Wind" is a sort of hippie community where they make nut butters and hammocks, reportedly in the nude. There's also a Gay Sanctuary somewhere in the midst. I love Ava, it's a charming town that for all of it's "boogers" seems more progressive than other towns of it's size. The square has a Health Food store, an art gallery, antique stores and a pet shop, among other things.

We belong to a food coop which ships once a month and we pick our items up at the VFW building just off the square in Ava. We are able to get the same stuff the health food stores get, only at a significantly discounted price. The group also buys organic produce and ships it in for pickup on the same day. Therefore, we have wonderful fruits and vegetables for about 2 weeks so we eat mostly raw meals and juice a lot. The other 2 weeks we resort to the frozen and canned foods and I actually have to cook!

The excitement my family reserves for coop day just goes to show how very strange we are. It is a big deal to plan our order the week before the pick-up and then we must wait patiently for the big day. Everyone helps to clean out the pantry, the refrigerator and the basement where we store all of our excess canned foods and the deep-freeze. We make sure we have enough jars and baggies to divide those things that need to be divided and frozen, i.e. raisins, cashews, barley, carob chips, to name a few. Most things are purchased in bulk so storage is a must. To go grocery shopping, we need go no further than our basement!

We never know what time the truck is going to arrive on the pick-up days until the night before it arrives so the entire day must be reserved. Before going to get our order, we always make a stop at the health-food store for the few items that I can't buy through the co-op (or that are simply too expensive to buy in bulk). Jean's Healthway has the best chocolate drops that we buy for a treat and I usually pick up milk for the kids that is supplied by the local dairy--they don't treat their cows with hormones or antibiotics. Jean's also has hard-to-find bulk herbs and spices.

There is a pharmacy right down the street from the building where the coop meets. The kids and I always make it a point to stop in and have an ice cream cone. They have an old-fashioned soda fountain complete with red vinyl barstools, black and white checkered floor and a jukebox. Most notably, ice cream cones are $.05 a scoop! The atmosphere and the price make it a nostalgic event (for me, anyway) that we look forward to once a month.

Around the corner from the soda fountain is a pet shop. We went there for the first time last Friday and it is delightful! The man who was working there was happy to let the kids hold the myriad of hamsters, guinea pigs, ferrets and bunnies and littlewho even held a python (don't be too alarmed, it wasn't much bigger around than my thumb). They had lots of birds, 2 of which were quite large and spoke very eloquently. One bird, if I remember correctly, was a Cockatoo. She was a beautiful, whitish-coral color and loved people! She would climb outside her cage, hang on with one foot and stretch the other out, indicating that she wanted to sit on your arm. I held my arm out to her and she hopped right onto it and proceeded to chant, "Dolly's a pretty girl, SQUAWK, Dolly's a pretty girl, HELLO!"

After killing time and not running into any "Booger-men", we converged on the VFW building like locusts to pick up our food; rushing in and out to get the items into our vehicles before it spoiled and then we headed home. By coop day, everyone is craving something besides beans and rice and it's like Christmas! We all stand around the kitchen and taste everything in site, avocados, mangos, strawberries, baby spinach, yummm! Shopping this way is much more economical; I save about $250 dollars a month and I rarely ever have to go to the grocery store. I would do it for that reason alone, even if it didn't save me money!