Each season brings with it our favorite candies. As Easter approaches, so do jelly beans. When September rolls around the corner, out comes candy corn. Candy canes and Christmas go hand and hand. Once the jingle bells have been tucked away, it’s time for Valentine candy.
There’s heart-shaped boxes of chocolate, cinnamon red-hots, heart-shaped gumdrops, pink and red M&M’s,and every one’s favorite: conversation hearts. Introduced in the 1860’s, these pastel-colored candies printed with love words, come in two sizes; large and small. This year, 8 billion hearts will be produced for Valentine’s Day.
Saturday night, we were picking up a few things for the weekend at Meijer. We were headed to the check-out, approaching the Valentine candy display, when Dwight said, “Ellynne’s mad because she can’t find hearts here.” “Oh, there must be hearts,” I said disbelieving. Spurred on by the thought of proving them wrong, I honed in on the bins of pink packaged candy. Butterfinger hearts, Reeses peanut butter hearts, Snickers hearts, SweetTart hearts, but no conversation hearts. I walked around the corner; still looking. Heart-shaped Nerds, Russell Stover chocolates, Brachs cinnamon flavored gumdrops; but no hearts. “How can they not have hearts, they’ve got Cadbury Creme Eggs, for Pete’s sake!” “Ellynne says Courtney’s Meijer has them,” he added. We threw the cinnamon gumdrops in the cart and headed home.
When Ellynne got home that night, the pink Brachs bag was lying open on the coffee table. “Hey, where did you find hearts?” she asked, grabbing the bag. “Oh, you mean they have these things, and no hearts?” she said, disappointed. “Courtney’s Meijer has them,” she added.
The weekend passed, the gumdrops were eaten, and Monday began anew. Ellynne was sitting at the counter doing her homework, when I remembered to ask whether or not she had seen my Cadbury Creme egg. “Nope,” she answered. Dwight looked sideways at her and smiled knowingly. “You haven’t seen it since the last bite you took of it, right?” he asked. “Who cares about Cadbury Creme eggs,” she said, shaking her head. “I want hearts!” “Did you know that Courtney’s Meijer has hearts?”
We were thinking about moving to Jenison, when Dwight found the Standale Crossings’ stash of 2011’s 8 billion conversation hearts, tucked neatly into the bulk food section of Produce.
