I can clearly remember the first time I bit into a Girl Scout Cookie: I was a scrawny third-grader coming home from a terrible day of school where I spent my recess in the time-out chair. I walked home sad as could be, believing the world was against me. Then, like magic, sitting on my kitchen table was a glass of skim milk and a row of Thin Mints; All was well in the world again. My mommy had put together an after school snack that would forever change my life. For those brief moments, nothing else mattered--just me, those cookies, and not a care in the world.
The fling I shared with those cookies that spring day turned into a lifelong affair, an amazing ride I wouldn't trade for all the Double Stuffed Oreos in the world.
Ever since i was young, those cookies have been there for me, through thick and thing. The laughs we've had, the tears we've cried, and the lessons those cookies have taught me I will carry forever.
Oh the times I've pretended to be sick to stay home from school, just so I could spend quality time alone with the cookies! A smile still comes to my face when I look back and remember the first time I was old enough to purchase boxes all by myself -- I know you enjoyed my $30 to buy new badges, but not as much as I enjoyed devouring those ten boxes. Oh the memories!
Like all good couples, your cookies and I have gone through our rough times. For example, at the beginning of each selling season I must sort out what old cookies you've retired and which "rookie cookies" (as I like to call them) I must learn to love. Then there was the dramatic even in the early 2000s when you shocked the world by raising your price per box without warning from $3 to $3.50.
Change is hard to deal with, but with time I've learned to cope -- that is until your most recent act has rendered our relationship incapable of ever fully recovering.
Maybe you thought I wouldn't notice -- or maybe you hoped I wasn't paying attention -- but I've found out your dirty tricks and I'm going to let the world know about them.
You've taken my favorite cookie, those "tender vanilla cookies, covered with caramel, rolled in toasted coconut and striped with a rich, chocolaty coating" and spit in my face. By changing the name of Samoas to Caramel deLites you have taken an American Classic and put it to shame.
When I first discovered you had changed the name, it was reminiscent of when I found out the Easter Bunny wasn't the one hiding eggs in my basket, or there really wasn't a leprachaun leaving little green foot prints in the kitchen -- but a million times worse.
In a cookie world where Nabisco and Keebler are the corporate bosses, it is you, Girl Scouts of America, who had stood strong. For eighty years, Girl Scout cookies have been an American staple of what is good. But now you've changed that. Why you have is uncertain; I'm not hee to find out what your motives were for this life-altering decision, all I know is it's wrong.
Changing the name "Samoa" to "Caramel deLites" may seem like a miniscule happening, but what's next? Will Thin Mints become Diet Chocolate Crisps? Will Tagalongs be called Choco-Peanut Butter Reduced-Fat Treats?
Or will you bump the price of cookies to $6.50 a box, sell them daily at local grocery stores and attempt to stomp out 'Keebler Elf' with a dog-eat-dog mentality?
Girl Scouts of America, I come to you with a heavy heart, with a pleas that you sotp going down the path you have begun to follow.
I wish I could rant on -- I have diaries full of bickeing I want to share with the world but can't -- so I leave you with this thought: "A cookie may be a cookie by any other name; but a Girl Scout cookie is not just an ordinary cookie."
Have you or someone you love been affected by the changes made to Girl Scout cookies? If so, check out their Web site, www.girlscouts.org or contact them by mail.
1 comment:
One of the most ridiculous articles I have ever read.
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