Cookies For The World
Phyllis needed cheering. She had just hit eighty and felt every aged year. Today’s politics would have left her parents spinning wildly in their coffins. So much anger! Inflation never went away, especially for daily needs such as food and medicine. Wars continued. Poverty and inequity continued. It was a lousy world in which to raise grandchildren (much less great grandchildren.) Phyllis believed the world needed cheering. How? Public anger was everywhere.
She was already a member of Women’s Strike For Peace, attending meetings, hosting displays, baking cookies. The display pamphlets mostly remained untouched–but the cookies were always gone. And she remembered that real estate agents had cookies baking in the oven when showing a house—the aroma made it feel like home.
She created a new project and called it Cookies For The World. She raised billions and began building high tech cookie factories all over the world. She arranged distribution, ensuring the cookies would be sold well below cost. After three months, most of the factories were churning out cookies, chocolate chip being the most popular. People living around the factories relished the aroma–the whole area smelled like home.
The cookies cost almost nothing and were on every grocery and convenience store shelf. The packages kept the cookies fresh while emitting a fresh baked aroma. Everyone in such a store quickly was in a happy place, all day long. When they did not want to go home, they took some cookies with them. Cookies were in every politician’s office, every financial institution, in vending machine on the streets. No one gained weight because of the special, natural ingredients. The cookies contained little sugar, plus vitamins and minerals and fibre.
Some people ate only cookies.
Phyllis was stunned the world had not changed: the anger continued, the wars continued–even though so many were now happy. They were happy with their anger. Phyllis realized she had made the situation worse. Phyllis immediately start work on a new line of nose plugs.
Just because the world smelled good did not mean it was good.