Do You Remember Penny Candy?

To all my Boomer/Gen X contemporaries out there, and be honest, do you sometimes find your eyes automatically scanning the ground for coins when you’re crossing a parking lot or outside a store? And do you still see value in a penny, nickel, dime, quarter, or half-dollar and smile, perhaps stopping to pick it up, while mildly rejoicing?

Of course, I’m harking back to our childhood days in the 60s and 70s when a child could trade in a one-cent coin for a piece of penny candy. Can you still taste that tootsie roll, root beer barrel, or jawbreaker in your mouth?

And if one discovered a nickel, well, that kid could buy a full-size chocolate bar, a glass bottle of Coca-Cola, a Reese’s peanut butter cup, or a pack of baseball cards with a thin slab of gum inside. And, if one found a dime, they could purchase the newest comic book!

But if you were blessed with a lost quarter, you now had awesome purchasing power and could reward yourself with a classic McDonald’s hamburger or a small bag of French fries. And forget about it if you scooped up a JFK fifty-cent piece because you were now rich for a day!

Do you recall any of this?

I love nostalgia, especially now that I’m much older. I so love it that I’m incorporating it into my novels in The Golden Slide series. I will routinely reach back in time to pull into my modern books my reminiscences and pleasures from my childhood days. Music, movies, novels, TV, and other sources of nostalgia will be included to spice up the stories.

What is life without fond and powerful memories to bring smiles to our faces when we perhaps lose the ability or desire to create new ones? So, my modern-day Boomer/Gen X characters will share glimpses of early-life events that shaped their personalities and futures. I’m certain the reader will find a lot in common with the nostalgia interwoven across the pages of my clean and benign books.

So, today, go out into the world, remembering the special moments from your past as you create more amazing memories! May God always bless you, as you pursue your best that is still to come!

^“They hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph. And there was the baby, lying in the manger. After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child. All who heard the shepherds’ story were astonished, but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them often.” (Luke 2:16-19 NLT)