Just A Simple Bottle Of Soda-Pop

Although most geezers begin reminiscing whenever faced with something that triggers an old memory, those of us with blogs can then expose those moldy thoughts to hyperspace. My latest mental adventure occurred while I was fighting the exasperating behavior of a modern soft drink machine. You know the kind I mean — it has bottles of everything from water (don’t get me started) to fruit juice, at prices that roughly equal what we used to pay for a full meal in a good restaurant.

Anyhow, while trying to smooth out my folding money so that the machine would recognize it and not keep spitting it back in my face, I began to think about how much simpler the process was when I was a kid. And I’m not talking about those mechanical machines that chugged and whirred and dispensed bottles one at a time but rather what came before, and that’s the image that formed in my mind.

I thought about a hot day, and going into the neighborhood grocery or maybe a gas station, walking up to a metal tank with a hinged top, and pulling out a cold bottle from amongst the clinking crowd in the frigid water. It would probably be Royal Crown Cola (although we called it RC) because it was more for the money and I was frugal even then. I’d then pop off the cap on the side-mounted opener, walk over to the guy behind the counter and toss him a nickel that I’d pulled out of my pocket with my grubby hand. I’d then walk outside while swigging down the cold, fizzy liquid so quickly that I’d get a headache.

Has anything ever tasted better?

Ray Lynch – “Celestial Soda Pop”