A Taste of Yesterda
January 17, 2012 in Bill Shiver Articles
Remember those little Coke bottles that were made of wax? You bit off the top and slurped out about a tablespoonful of sweet syrupy liquid. Four of them cost 5 cents. Then you’d chew on the wax bottle the rest of the day.
Don’t know why I got to thinking about those little bottles, but I remember them like it was yesterday. Back when I was a kid some company made some flavored tablets that you’d drop into a glass of water. They’d fizz like an Alka Seltzer and the water would turn orange or purple depending on the flavor. It tasted plumb awful but my, it was fun watching those tablets fizz and foam.
We also had some soda straws that came filled with powder. Chocolate or strawberry. You would put the straw into a glass of milk and the result was supposed to be wonderful. It wasn’t, but it was yet another gimmick that we couldn’t resist. None of these things lasted very long, but they were part of our lives growing up.
Life was not only kinder and gentler back then, it was simpler too. Didn’t take as much to excite us or keep us amused. I remember on summer days lying in the grass of our yard, shaded by some pines and a big holly tree. We had a little patch of wild mint in the yard and I’d pluck some leaves and chew on them. I’d watch the white fluffy clouds floating across the blue summer sky and imagine all kinds of shapes. Lions, tigers and bears, oh yes.
We have so much today that many of us have forgotten some of those simple pleasures. Amazing what fun we could have for a nickel or a dime. And the memories, for me at least, have lasted for lots of years.
