Suck It Up

I've got these lollipops and mints here at my computer desk. If I were the sort of man who could easily bear throwing things out, I would have thrown them out a long time ago. I can't put a date on when I acquired each one of them, but I can say for the lollipops that I must have bought a couple of years ago or more. They were packaged to promote a movie which came out at least five years ago, but then I figure that lollipops don't spoil. After all, there's nothing real in them.

If I haven't thrown them out but still have them, you must be wondering how it is that I haven't eaten them. The rather obvious answer is that they are not good. Their flavoring is passable, but not exactly as potent as your name brand hard candies. Even worse, the coloring of them tends to stay with you. What I mean by that is that if you eat a blue one, there's blue on your lips and blue on your teeth, and a vigorous effort to remove them by means of toothpaste and mouthwash is apt to yield mixed results. When a man is caught marked by lipstick he is at least know to have achieved something laudable, but the consumption of lollipops is better to keep secret.

A secondary consideration is that as an adult I care more about the health of my teeth than I did when I was a boy. I know now that they are not invulnerable and I know the cost of addressing damage compared to preventative care. The idea of harboring such a tooth-destroyer as a lollipop right there behind the tooth makes me wince just to think of it. I may have a hard time doing away with my consumption of soda, but I can bear to stop eating lollipops.

Regrettably, I'm in a tough spot presently. I have been sniffling and sneezing, occasionally experiencing a sore throat as well. I ran out of tissues just before I got ill, and didn't have any lozenges at that time to begin with. One can ameliorate a sore throat by drinking fluids only so much before becoming water-logged. It was for those reasons that I resigned myself to eating a lollipop. It was not delicious and presented the constant hazard of staining something with its perfidious coloring, but I was diligent in keeping my mustache out of the way and candy momentarily eased my discomfort without incident. I hope soon to procure lozenges, so as to avoid a repeat of it.