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Drinking Kool-Aid
Kool-Aid says “Summer,” in my frame of reference. Summer picnics always included Mom’s Tupperware pitcher filled with red Kool-Aid. In the backyard, my brothers, cousins and I played in our bathing suits in the sprinkler on hot summer days, refreshed by cups of Kool-Aid. We had a large yellow rubber pool, which really wasn’t a pool. It was from the Army Surplus, and was some sort of inflated raft or life boat. Nothing like today’s plastic inflatables, disposable when torn. This lasted for years. A puncture, rare, but possible, was repaired with a tire patch. When filled with the garden hose, it was about 2 feet deep. I remember how hot the rubber got under the summer sun; hands and bottoms burned when trying to sit on the big pillow sides. We tried to jump over and in without touching it! When the rubber was hot it emitted a smell, not unpleasant, but so unique that whenever I chanced upon that smell, even today, it returns me to the backyard in Michigan, filled with laughter and sprays of water, and, of course, Kool-Aid.
Dave made an envelope of his Kool-Aid. “Did you know this takes a whole cup of sugar?” he asked. Yes, I did know, because I used to make it. We sold it at our Kool-Aid stands for nickels. I also made it for Kool-Aid-cicles. We poured it into ice cube trays, added Popsicle sticks and froze them. My favorite was cherry, my least favorite was grape. At one point in our endless summers, Mom acquired Tupperware Popsicle Holders, and we made official Popsicles.
I watched Dave stirring his Kool-Aid and realized he was making flavored hummingbird nectar. What IS Kool-Aid, I wondered. How old is this product? I discovered it was created by Edwin Perkins in 1927, in Hastings, Nebraska. In his mother’s kitchen he figured out how to reduce Fruit Smack Concentrate to a powder, saving the manufacturer money in shipping costs. He moved his kitchen business to Chicago in 1931, sold his invention to General Foods in 1953, and I imagine he retired as a wealthy man. The second weekend in August in Hastings, Nebraska, they celebrate Kool-Aid Days, as Kool-Aid is Nebraska’s official soft drink.
I don’t hear much mention of Kool-Aid anymore except in the negative urban-use “What Kool-Aid is he drinking?” Thanks to Jim Jones and his Jonestown, Guyana, mess in 1978, when he forced his flock to commit suicide by drinking poisoned grape Kool-Aid, today’s children probably don’t know how much fun Kool-Aid is. In air-conditioned homes they drink “Safe” drinks that come in little boxes or pouches with straws and made with artificial sweeteners. Nothing like cherry Kool-Aid they made themselves, drunk while sitting in the grass under a sprinkler. Aah. Now that’s summer.