April 15, 2024
Another in a series of observations of life as I know it.
Girl Scout Cookies are life's way of rewarding you for giving up on your
New Year's Resolutions.
-Anonymous
~~~~~
Nothing can take one down memory’s rabbit hole faster than the glimpse of a Girl Scout selling cookies. Tiny girls wearing sashes bedecked with badges. Such was the heartwarming tableau in the parking lot of Friends Market this morning. A tipsy card table, a harried mom and two scouts hawking Thin Mints. Be still my heart. I don’t normally carry much in the way of cash, but today I was flush with tens and twenties. But, no need! These 8 year old humans had Venmo. Be Prepared is, if course, the scouts’ motto. I was so proud.
I chatted with the mom while carefully gauging my selection. Was one box of Thin Mints enough? Six too many? The girls carefully judged my age and offered up the newest product, gluten free Trefoils! Know your audience, I always say. Then I mentioned, in passing, that when I was but a wee Brownie, cookies were 25 cents per box. The girls looked upon me like an ancient artifact, barely breathing. Then corrected me by saying that today’s little cardboard boxes are, gulp, $6 apiece.
Fortunately, today’s Girl Scouts know CPR and other lifesaving measures. Once I regained consciousness, they tenderly scraped me off the pavement, took $18 of my change and assisted me into my car. Inflation has run amok. Is there no decency left in the world? Apparently not. When I was selling these very cookies, I went door to door in my neighborhood, in competition with the 3 parochial school tots up the street and the high school aged senior scout in the cul de sac. I dressed in my mint green, freshly iron uniform with its jaunty beret atop my ponytailed coif. And headed straight for the homes of my parents’ best friends—Mrs Estes, Mrs Herring and elderly Mrs Quick. Her actual name. I had my official clip board, sharpened pencil and cookie catalog to hand. I prided myself on organization and efficiency. No dawdling or wasting precious time which might allow my competitors a chance to slip into the breach. Of course, my dad’s office manager and nurse were always good for a healthy receipt. As were my grandparents. Once orders were taken, my mom checked my math and we sealed the envelope with the cash and forms. When the much anticipated large containers arrived, I pulled out my trusty red wagon and made prompt deliveries. Followed by a personal thank you note to each client. Yes, I was THAT good.
Remembrance of things past includes cookies made tastier by my own commercial skills. Back when a quarter per box seemed more than adequate. Now that fee is preciously quaint. With that in mind, at the usurious price of $6, I will judiciously dole out after dinner Thin Mints. To savor and recall my forays into enterprise as a Girl Scout, albeit back in the last Ice Age. Pass me a DoSiDo and a Samoa served with a frosty glass of milk. Or skip the pleasantries and just hand me the Thin Mints en masse. Thin being the operative word.
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Sadly, inflation only goes one way.
Too funny!!