There’s something to be said for the side-of-the-road economy, whether legitimate or on the sly, and no place in Boston showcases this with the same vigor than the west side of Dorchester.

Sure, there are plenty of stores and eateries and tire shops to support, and I like that as much as the next person. At the same time, a huckster on the side of the road can be enticing. You’ll find them on Talbot and Blue Hill avenues and along Washington Street, and sometimes in little nooks around the neighborhoods.

Last month I was transported back to another lifetime when a vendor pulled up in the Endicott School parking lot across from Franklin Park with a flatbed full of watermelons. Now these weren’t the usual seedless, circular watermelons you’ll find in the store, or at the fruit markets of Boston. These old boys were long, like boats, full of seeds and with dark-green stripes.

“You’re not going to find these in any store,” proclaimed the seller. “You gotta go down to at least Maryland to find this kind of melon.”

For all that, he had me before he even spoke. We sliced it up in thick servings like a Prime USDA steak and chowed down for a week. I enjoyed spitting out the seeds more than the melon, and it made me recall growing up below the Mason-Dixon line, like a lot of folks west of Washington, how once or twice a summer, a man from southern Arkansas would drive up and park on the side of the highway with a flatbed full of watermelons – Black Diamond watermelons so dark green that they looked black and so red inside you’d have thought they were bleeding seeds.

He’d pitch a tent by the highway and stick around until he sold off the lot, slashing a dollar off the price if he was in a hurry to get back home.

That same spirit exists in the neighborhoods west of Washington, maybe because a lot of people here grew up with the same kind of watermelon experiences I had. Or maybe because a lot of people enjoy the informal economy that springs to life in buying sugarcane out of the back of a step van that is labeled “Atlas Movers,” or a bowl of delicious meat-infused rice and beans from a lady with a hot plate rigged up to her car’s cigarette lighter.

For most of my adult life, I’ve seen a guy selling tiger-striped rugs on the fence by Franklin Park. I’ve never pulled the lever on one of those — my wife would kill me — but someone must be buying them, or he wouldn’t have been there for so long.

A personal favorite is the Father Pine snow cone man who sets up by Dorchester Courthouse, and sometimes farther up by Murl’s Restaurant, a real gift from above on hot days. While Father Pine is a legit, licensed cart, that shouldn’t take away from it being a side-of-the-road situation. I like coconut, with “blue” being a close second, but there’s about a dozen flavors that will sugar you up and leave you smiling the rest of the day. It’s a three-buck bargain in my opinion and, for me, it’s made better for being on the side of the road.

The old standby is the ice cream man. In our neighborhood, they’ve had the same wobbly truck rolling through every summer since maybe 1964. There are times when I don’t think the beast is going to make it to another summer, but every year they’re back, announced by a blast of the ice cream anthem, that 1890s blockbuster hit, “Turkey in the Straw.” But the ice cream man leaves more questions than answers, such as how can the white-on-a-bomb pop be lime flavor, and why does the loudspeaker proclaim “Hello!” before playing another maddening round of the ice cream anthem.

Then there’s the mobile car wash mafia down Talbot Avenue. There’s anywhere from three to a half-dozen van-based car washes going on every Sunday down by Franklin Field, and I’ve certainly indulged in taking my turn there. I like the automated smoothness of the Mattapan Car Wash or the Neponset Car Wash, but there’s some fun ingenuity on Talbot.

These guys pull up in a van and have a power washer running out of the back. One blasts your car with cascading water pressurized from a gas-engine in the rear of a nondescript white van, while a second fella uses a Shop-Vac (and I’m not sure how that’s powered) to give a good spruce up of the interior. All you have to do is sit on the wall at Franklin Field in the shade. Maybe you’ve got a coconut Father Pine in hand, and if you do, rest assured, the car wash fellas work at such speeds that they’ll be done long before it melts.

Alas, some of the neighbors don’t like the mobile car wash mafia, and I probably wouldn’t either if I lived across the street. This past summer the Boston Police put the brakes on the situation and clamped their power hoses. One guy relocated to private property at a nearby tire shop, but I noticed that the price increased dramatically. But even with the crackdown, the side-of-the-road operators returned. Maybe they’re legit now (I’d rather not know, and I’m not going to be the one asking questions). Questions aren’t taken on the side of the road.

EXTRAORDINARY TREES
I’ve been taken aback the last few years by an extraordinary Weeping Willow tree on Wolcott Street off Erie Street. I’m no tree hugger and I don’t shed any tears over sawdust, but I have great respect for trees that stand out.

I noticed this tree a few years ago when a relative moved near Columbia Road. In a street of three-deckers and six-families, this Weeping Willow towers nearly twice as high as the tallest roof, and then drapes down gracefully over the middle of the street. It’s startling to see, and most wouldn’t notice as Wolcott Street isn’t a destination unless you live there.

I’ve asked around to some of the long-time residents who can trace their days back to when that was a Jewish enclave. I figure there’s got to be a story there somewhere. The tree appears to pre-date the neighborhood, but no one knew much about it other than it’s always been there.
There’s another of my favorite trees in Walsh Park, a grand old Oak that is west of Washington by about 10 feet. Judging from the girth of the trunk and the limbs, it must be hundreds of years old.

Both trees are older than anyone I know.

THANKS TO LAQUISA
Closer to home in the West of Washington (WOW) neighborhood, things were cranking this summer with so many activities and activism in the neighborhood. That was not the case before the WOW group started, and the new deal was mostly built off the energy of neighbor Laquisa Burke, a life-long resident. Before her organizing efforts, most of us lived in a small circle, locked the doors, and closed the blinds on the outside world for a few decades. That has changed. Last week, Burke said that she’s stepping back a bit and taking a breather after six years at the helm. We can only say thank you to her for waking us all up.