Cupboard Memories*

In these days of advertising everywhere and things with names like "google", it is sometimes hard to know what to believe. In fact my general response is to try to tune it all out. It's one thing to have ads in magazines and newspapers. It's another to find stickers on your fruit, logos on your clothing and phone calls at dinnertime selling everything from credit cards to carpet cleaning. Cereal boxes shout "NEW!" , "Organic" and "Heart Healthy". There is a "reduced calorie"version of everything. What, in fact does any of this really mean ?

I found myself looking at the Coleman's Mustard can today and realizing that it has been around, unchanged, for as long as I can remember. I buy it because I love the old familiar can, dignified and secure in the knowledge that it contains a quality product because it is "by appointment to Her Majesty..."

I began looking around the kitchen for other products with labels that had never changed in all the years I have been using them. I began to think of a few others like Challenge butter with a stag on the label, (Why a stag--I have no idea. I don't care.) which I have always bought for the very reason that they are exactly the same as when my mother bought them. They take me back to a simpler time. There is something comfortable about them. They don't challenge my intelligence or my credulity. They have nothing to prove. They are what they are. And I really like them for that.

*Credit to OilMan