The other day my sisters went to Target with my mom and came back with a box of Berry Berry Kix. Now, for those of you who don’t know, Berry Berry Kix is one of the most amazing breakfast cereals ever. It has normal Kix in it, and also berry flavored Kix. When I was younger, almost every time I went to my grandparents’ house and slept over, we would have Berry Berry Kix in the morning. Back then the berry flavored Kix were actually shaped like berries, some pink and some purple. My sisters and I would sit around the box and try to find all the matching twins on the back in the crowded mall scene. The back of the box stayed the same for years, and we would always search eagerly to find the people we had found many times before. When my sisters brought home a box the other day, we mourned over the fancy new box design which omitted the mall hide and seek, and the new cereal design which turned the berries into regular old spherical Kix. But the smell remains the same. As soon as I smelled the box, all those memories of sitting around the table, wearing one of my grandfather’s old t-shirts as pajamas, came flooding back. It’s amazing the power that smell can have, especially because we can barely even describe smells to one another. But one whiff of a familiar smell can take you back to when you were 6, and sitting around your grandparents’ table.
This Berry Berry Kix-induced nostalgia lead me to think back to more awesome memories of being a kid. Summer is a great time to look back at awesome memories from when you were younger- even if they weren’t anything special at the time. Like running to the ice cream truck with your siblings as it plays The Sting around the neighborhood, playing Cops and Robbers with your cousins in a small backyard, running through a sprinkler on a hot day and screaming every time the cold spray catches you by surprise, scootering up and down the driveway pretending that you’re going on grand adventures, sitting on rocks by a river and falling in- a little by accident and a little on purpose, and many, many barbeques with family or friends, running around with the kids while the grown-ups stay on the porch and chat. I love thinking back to days like that, where you didn’t even know you were making memories, but you hear the ice cream truck song, or see a sprinkler spraying a lawn, or you smell a barbeque, and those fun moments come flooding back. And just to think that in another 20-ish years I will have so many more memories to look back on fondly is exciting. Because I know I’ve yet to make those memories, and sometimes making memories is just as fun as remembering. But right now I think I’ll go have a big bowl of Berry Berry Kix.
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