Embarrassing childhood stories You are infinitely cooler than me. we all have them. I, for one, have far too many of those to count. But it’s these stories that are often the most entertaining and fond to look back on. One such story is why I never ate Airheads until I was in the fourth grade.
Now for those of you who may not be familiar, an Airhead is a candy that is chewier/tougher than your average taffy and immensely sugary. This candy was particularly popular when I was in elementary school, with commercials such as this one being quite common. My greatest memory of this candy is specifically the commercial where kids are eating the candy, and then their heads fly off after blowing up like a balloon.
Well, this is where the embarrassing portion comes in. I, being the oh-so-bright and not-gullible child that I was (sarcasm intended), saw these commercials as a documentary of what would actually occur to me if I ate Airheads.
How could anyone eat more than one Airhead if they had no head to eat with? Why would anyone want to lose their head for a single candy? There are so many candies out there to eat before I want my head to fly off like a balloon. These thoughts and more flooded my 10-year-old mind and seemed to provide perfect reasoning. I saw the ads, the videos were clear as day to me what would occur if I ate the candy, and I decided the candy wasn't worth the risk.
That changed finally when, while in fourth grade, I noticed a classmate secretly eating an Airhead during class. I braced myself for the flying head in 3... 2... 1... and nothing. Imagine my shock to see that child’s head perfectly intact after eating this candy that I had believed for my entire 10-year-old life would result in a headless person. Certainly, this isn’t one of my proudest moments.
However, reflecting on it now, I notice just how important of a moment that was. Maybe others will believe I’m placing too much importance on a silly moment in my childhood, but I see many lessons that stemmed from this moment. I learned that not everything I see can be taken at face value. That commercial, at face value, told my childlike brain that my head would fly off if I ate the candy. This was the starting point of understanding that just because I see something with my own eyes doesn’t make it true or real. I learned that I need to use my own reason to discern what is true and not just accept everything I am exposed to as absolute truth. I learned that something I had believed for years could actually be wrong.
These lessons seem especially fitting in college, where my mind is introduced daily to ideas and concepts that I have never considered before, or have just outright disagreed with before. I would have liked to say that this childhood memory was something that occurred before I grew up, but really, I’m still growing. To have grown up means to me that one has reached the end of growing, but nobody reaches that point.
