Bernie's Hardware Store

The wooden floor wore decades of dust. Near the doorway brooms grew out of a fire bucket and bloomed in an odd array of heads. A pile of coir mats lay stacked in a wheelbarrow, all chorused in a WELCOME. Bernie's store was a haphazard sprawl of hardware stuff and followed no order at least by any stretch of logic. Hammers were paired with paint, boxes of nails mixed company with hinges and fittings for copper pipes. And yet, Bernie had every item carefully mapped in his head. Ask for something and he would take you straight to the spot. It had the air of a serious place, almost like a church. Tools were the blessed instruments of a sacred order, treated with care and reverence. Back then power tools were just coming in but none contaminated the sanctified air of Bernie's hardware store. On the back wall, above the garden tools, hung a plain wooden crucifix beside a picture of Bernie's late wife. From her lofty height she seemed to look down with an approving smile every time the cash register rang, accompanied by a “thanks”.