Kool-Aid, Kool-Aid tastes great!

Wish we had some.  Can’t Wait!

Is there anybody besides me old enough to remember that jingle?  Remember the smiling pitcher and the Kool-Aid Kids?  At the end of the jingle, it always said—

The Kool-Aid Kids are off again to visit other lands.

Be sure to join them when they do;

Join them in some Kool-Aid, too!

When I was a child, Kool-Aid was a favorite summer drink and much less expensive than bottled soft drinks.  A 10-cent package of Kool-Aid mix and a cup of sugar would make a half gallon of the drink.  I think grape was my favorite. 

I remember when I was quite young, we would often visit my grandparents. There would always be Kool-Aid.  My grandparents had 10 children so most of the time several other of my cousins would be there.  That is probably why my grandmama served an inexpensive easy to prepare drink, Kool-Aid. 

One time in particular when I was visiting grandmama, one of these cousins was there.  She was slightly older than I was.  And as I was soon to learn, slightly wiser as well.

It was a hot summer day and after an hour of playing outside in the heat we were very thirsty.  We took off around the house to find Grandmama.  She was the one to see at a time like this.

It was an old white farmhouse with a porch across the front.  On one end hung a bench swing.  This was one of our favorite places to play.  We took turns pushing each other.  It was as much fun to push as it was to swing. When you pushed high enough, you could hold on to the back of the swing and it would lift you high up off the floor with the backswing.

There were two doors on the front porch.  One opened into the living room and the other one opened into the front bedroom.  Both doors were equally used.  The door to the kitchen opened up to the front bedroom, so through the front bedroom was a shortcut to the kitchen.

 A small bedroom and the kitchen stretched across the back of the house.  In the kitchen is where we found Grandmama.  That was where she spent much of her time, preparing meals for all of us. 

 The kitchen was a long and narrow room.  The kitchen floor sloped gently toward the back door.  On one end of the room was a long table with chairs.  Alongside the table was an old wooden buffet with doors and drawers.  The refrigerator sat in one corner of that part of the room.

The other end of the long room was for food preparation.  There was a stove, a sink, a white cabinet, and a flour bin.  The flour bin was a four-legged rectangular wooden box with a hinged wooden lid.  Inside this box is where the flour and sugar were kept.

Grandmama often mixed-up tea cakes on top of this flour bin.  We grandkids would watch intently as she mixed the dough and dumped it out onto the floured surface.  She would pinch off a bit of dough for each of us to have a taste.  It was so wonderful.  Nothing has ever tasted so good, before or since.

On this afternoon Grandmama was at the sink mixing Kool-Aid.  Just what we needed.  She filled two glasses with the refreshing purple liquid and gave one to each of us.  We sipped on the sweet drink quenching our thirst. 

Then my cousin had a great idea!  We should have a race to see who could drink the most Kool-Aid.  It sounded like a grand idea to me.  I was sure I could win.  She, of course, was equally sure that she would be the winner.

Grandmama had busied herself somewhere else in the house and we were alone in the kitchen.  We carefully refilled our glasses.  I turned up my glass and guzzled it down.  My cousin had emptied her glass, too, so the glasses were filled again.  This time I drank more slowly.

Surprisingly, my cousin’s glass seemed to empty more quickly than mine.  So, I doubled my efforts.  I began to see that this was going to be a harder race to win than I had at first thought.

 I closed my eyes and took another big gulp.  How was she drinking so much?  I felt like I would explode if I took another sip.  But I could not give up.  I lifted the glass to my lips and sucked the sweet purple liquid into my mouth.  With great effort I swallowed it down. 

My glass was filled again.  Picking up the glass I started with it toward my mouth.  As I touched it to my lips there was a terrible rumbling in my stomach.  I took one more big gulp then set the glass down with a crash.

 I ran from the sink across the sloping floor to the back door.  Flinging it open I stood on the steps and knew that I had lost.  I lost all the purple Kool-Aid.  It came out my mouth, my nose, and I think my eyeballs which had been floating. I lost the Kool-Aid race.

Although I had lost, I have to say it had been a commendable effort on my part.  And I came to know much later that my much wiser cousin had stayed ahead in the competition by pouring hers down the sink. That’s what I get for playing by the rules!