Monday, November 25, 2013

orange tic-tacs


A loooooong time ago I used to walk to Hart's Store with my friend Lindsey. I'd have forty of my hard earned cents in my pocket and we'd take a short cut across the field to get there quicker. I'd buy watermelon flavored Bubblicious Bubble Gum, (Lindsey would buy grape) and then we'd walk back - most likely chatting about the club we'd built behind my neighbor's hedges, or our favorite hiding spot behind another neighbor's shed. We kept it simple. Watermelon gum.

On Friday I ran (drove) out to the store to pick up something for a dinner I was bringing to a friend. At the checkout I saw a pack of orange tic-tacs. Robs has wanted orange tic-tacs for as long as she can remember, but for some reason I've never bought them. (Maybe it's my pocket that still remembers forty cents... and gawks at the above-one-dollar price tag.) Whatever the reason... I forgot it yesterday and purchased a pack.

Robs' eyes lit up when she saw them. And then they lit up again when she figured out how to open the package. She put them in her pocket donned a furry coat and ran outside to show the boys.

It's crazy how much has changed since my childhood. I don't know if I'll ever let Robs walk to a store by herself before she's twelve, or twenty-one for that matter. And that's assuming there's a store within walking distance...

But then it's crazy how much hasn't changed. The boys were outside pushing each other in a car that's designed to drive on it's own (Their combined man-power was faster than the offered horse-power.) and they'd just finished playing ball in a neighbor's yard. They were all pretty excited by the orange tic-tacs.

I like keeping childhood simple.

Next time I might look for watermelon gum.


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