Sunday, March 22, 2009

Synchronicity and Life's Little Unappreciated Material Things

It starts with something small. The modern day equivalent of a cool Cracker Jack prize.  ...and for you youngers out there, Cracker Jacks used to have actual toys in them.  Small, yes, but dice, a plastic ring, a little game, etc.  Not just the stupid sticker or temp tattoo like you find now.  I think I might have had the very last little plastic ring EVER to come from a Cracker Jack box, but who knows?  Anyhow, I gave it to this girl in 2nd grade.  She was waaay cute, with dark hair and cute hypnotizing lips and sat next to me in the 70's equivilent of GATE class.  Friday's Cracker Jack romance, Monday's heartbreak, since over that very weekend, my Mom basically picked up the household and we moved down the street, but to a totally different city, unbeknownst to me.  Who saw that coming?.  Fuck!  Cracker Jacks used to have more peanuts, too.  Jerks!  I hate Cracker Jacks.

Ok, back on track.

Anyhow (and that's a word that's a sure sign that you don't know how to properly structure your writing; a an overused tool to jump subjects where you really shouldn't have jumped (but I digress).).*

So, back to that something small that so exciting**...  it's hard to explain what I mean, so I'll illustrate.

My friend Tony once said he was going to have a good day because there was an extra drumstick toe in his drumstick bag.

If you don't know (I didn't), the toe is the pointy part of the cone, deliciously filled with a nugget of chocolate.

The toe from another Drumstick had broken off and made it's way into his Drumstick bag.  What are the odds of that?  That means somewhere someone else got shafted.  Anyhow, it's one of the best parts -- delicious AND keeps the melting ice cream contained -- although I'd never heard it named before.

By the way, the Drumstick toe is a new thing.  When I was a kid, the cone tip was just an empty tip which collected melted ice cream until it eventually sogged out enough to start dripping through onto your pants.  I love Nestle!  I hope they take over Cracker Jack and bring more joy back to my life.

Here's a short list of things that bring unexpected little joys to my life.
  • Slightly popped popcorn kernels -- after the wholly popped ones are gone, these are the ones you eat before you throw out the ones that did nothing.  Crunchy and tasty little treats.  Trader Joe's actually makes whole bags of these things.  Never tried them...  It's just not the same.  However...  
  • Change in the newspaper coin return
  • Change in the payphone coin return
  • An extra treat falls from the vending machine spirals
  • Two bottles of Diet Pepsi come out of the machine! OMG!
  • Starbucks runs out of drip coffee right as you order, so you have to wait five minutes, but it's free OR they offer up an Americano! 
  • As they pick up the cookie, it breaks, so they toss it and a WHOLE one in the bag!  Road to fatness, but come on!.  If it's meant to be, it's meant to be!
I'm sure I'm missing a ton of obvious ones, but that's off the top of my head.

There's a weak moral to this blog, as illustrated by the Drumstick toe.  One person's loss is another one's gain.  Don't let that go to waste, and always check your bag, lest the universe go spinning out of control as one person's loss turns into no one's gain...

Oh, and also...   One person's loss is another one's gain.  I said that already?  Can't be said enough.  Next time you're saddened because you get home and realize that you forgot your change in the coin return, think of the guy who finds it later.  When a quarter rolls under your car and you're not dressed to crawl under there, think of the kid who'll find it and do more with it than you ever would have.  When the bag of trail mix gets stuck hanging in the vending machine, remember that trail mix only sounds healthy, it's not -- some skinny kid who actually needs the calories will now get two.  Synchronicity.

If you think of something good to add, post a comment.

Here's the astrisked things, in case you forgot. 

*  I gave up on the sentence.  It's my blog, I do my own thing.  Bet you didn't even notice that the whole sentence was "Anyhow."

**  girlfriend excepted, as that's another blog post entirely

3 comments:

  1. I can't think of any to add but like this post very much.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Every time an angry driver yells and cusses at me I think of how what I just did let him express his anger, so once he goes home, he won't have to yell at his family, cause he had a crappy day.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I like it when you're sitting next to a stranger, and you begin to talk and you find a kindred soul. I like long lines in grocery stores (unless I'm in a rush, which usually doesn't happen). I'll stand there looking at the impatient people around me and think "Why am I here..." I begin talking to someone, and, generally speaking, I usually walk out of the store understanding why I was there. People are lonely or people need a cheerful word. It makes me feel useful. I am stopping for cauliflower on the way home. I'm making your recipe today.

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...