Give Them This Day Their Daily Bread

One would be hard pressed to find a better place to grow up in the 60's than Côte-St-Luc.

Safety and security tinged with just the right amount of childhood danger and adventure. Also a great place for a kid to learn the lessons of working for hard-earned cash.

Take bread delivery for example. The Man's mom would pack a lunch and send the Boy off to meet his friend Ti-Guy who lived down the street. This was at 6AM. Off they'd go to Galardo's, a greasy spoon in the neighbourhood.

Galardo's in 1978 before it was demolished and turned into a bank.

This was where the local POM bakery guy would come for breakfast before commencing his delivery route for the day. Remember this was the 60's when bread and milk were delivered to your door and when moms weren't as paranoid as they are nowadays.

There were 2 different delivery guys on that route. One was an old crotchety asshole that never let the kids ride with him. The other one was a young dude that would jump at the chance to let kids do all the leg work. That explains why the company emblazoned the truck with a "NO RIDERS" sticker. Anyway, when the truck arrived, someone had to gather the nerve to ask if he was taking any "RIDERS" today. Once he let the kids tag along, everyone would jump into the truck and assume their roles. One kid would be at the back of the truck and fill the orders and one kid would be running to the house with the bread armed with the McGill rapid coin changer on his belt.

POM bakery had a system of coloured cards which the homeowner would put in their front window alerting the driver as to what they wanted that week. The Boy memorised these cards as he had them at home. He would call out the order and Ti-Guy would grab the loaves.

Needless to say that when the housewife opened the door and was faced with a cute kid, the tips would be monumental (that driver may have been lazy, but he wasn't stupid). After lunch the Boy would switch positions with Ti-Guy. At the end of the day the driver would return to Galardo's and he'd split the tips three ways. He'd also tell the kids to go in the back and take what they wanted. They would always opt for the Mae West cakes.

The Man says that he would net around $3-5 ($25-40 today), enough to keep him well supplied with Marvel comics and bubble gum cards, especially those dreaded Rat Patrol cards. Collecting those would introduce the Man to another life lesson. But that's a story for another day.