I miss Lazarus.

Remember falls? The big wigs of the 70s?
Not big as in up; big as in down. Fall, get it?

In the 70s, before there was a Wal-Mart culture that trapped us into one-stop shopping, my family and a few other families would drive every December to Lazarus (great name!) Dept Store in Wheeling to shop for Christmas.

There'd be, like, 3 moms, 3 dads, and maybe 8-9 kids. We'd go in two cars. It was before safety.

One year, on a whim, the three moms bought themselves falls. Then they ran outside Lazarus to the big intersection where the dads and us kids were supposed to swing by and pick them up.

It was raining like a sumbitch and everything was flying around. We kept driving around that big city block, looking for them, looking for them.

Suddenly my mom—I think! But she had long hair!—threw herself at the car and we all went, Oh my! There's the women now!

They got in with their big new hair streaming and sticking all over their faces. You can bet our own hair was sticking straight up on end. They were mad we hadn't recognized them. Geez, what'd they expect?