Jesus, Jane Austen, and Plumpy Walk Into a Medicine Cabinet

by gillis

What do Jesus, Jane Austen, and the Plumpy from the board game Candyland have in common? Here in the Gillis-Luf household they are all instruments in the healing arts. taken individually I am certain that each of these figures has brought comfort and solace to those who seek it, but I am not referring to their work, their words, or, in the case of Plumpy, the high fructose corn syrup blast he would impart were he real. I mean that literally, each of these figures provides a measure of healing in this house in the form of adhesive bandages.

I don’t know who decides which products will be given the hipster treatment each year during the holiday season (wouldn’t that be a fun job?), but someone out there decided that they needed to compete with the folks at Band-Aid to create adhesive bandages that might say something more profound about the wearer. Or is it patient- or victim in the case of bandages? In any case, members of this family received adhesive bandages as gifts during the holiday season. It is no longer possible to treat a paper cut, hangnail, or blister without making a statement in this house.

i remember when I was a kid and all we had were orthopedic-beige colored bandages. And in the Gillis household, they were all the same size. The fancy, Band-Aid brand with the varying sizes (Who can forget that adorable circular one? I always wanted to use that one!) were only found at my “rich” friends’ houses, the same families who used Dove soap and had Fritos in their cabinets. I was an adult when clear bandages came out, followed by Disney characters and the like. To me, bandages that don’t call attention to themselves seem like a good idea for adults and bandages that call great attention to themselves are equally helpful for children who want to show off their wounds.

I’m just not sure the world needs more irony in the form of adhesive bandages. Where does it end? Will we soon have Elvis tampons and Che Guevara cotton balls? If cotton swabs start sporting quotes from Yogi Bera and Edna St. Vincent Millay, we’ll be too busy reading the quotes to clean our ears. Oh, the humanity.