January 16, 2008

I grew up in farm country. For the first nine years of my life, I played in a yard that was surrounded on three sides by an electric fence. When we drove home from town, we would pass a silo that proudly proclaimed “M & M Farms”. We quizzed Mom as to why that was written on the silo and she told us that’s where M & M candies were born. The farm was actually owned by a married couple named Marshall & Mary, but I didn’t learn that until I was 25 (just kidding). Every time I grabbed a handful of M & Ms from Grandma Country’s three tiered candy dish, I would look at one of those candy coated drops of chocolate goodness in my hand and see the little “m” imprinted on it and revel in the fact that it wasn’t melting before my eyes. The little “m” seemed reassuring to me. It’d always be there until I ate it, that cute little “m”.

Now I see that Mars, Inc. is offering consumers the chance to have custom-printed slogans printed on the little candies for special occasions. I realise that they’ve been doing this for a couple of years, but it’s only recently that I’ve been seeing the ads plastered all over television. I was hoping that the fad of custom printed M & Ms had passed because to me though whole concept seems unnatural, like jokes printed on a Pringles chip or “Just Shoot Me” being considered “classic television”.

So today I feel motivated to buy a three-tiered candy dish and load it up with classic M & Ms. I’ll use them as a treat, gaze at the little “m” and revel in the fact that they melt in my mouth, not in my hand.