Minty Fresh (Part 1)

There’s a conspiracy. It’s in small towns and big cities. Impossible to escape. On the surface, it seems normal. Natural. Something so seemingly wholesome but in fact sinister at best. It’s called the Girl Scouts of America.

These Girl Scouts knock on your door, dressed in para-military uniforms, selling their fattening cookies. So innocent. Supposedly to obtain a badge. Really they’re training to become aggressive sales people. Who created this group? Corporate America? Maybe. There might’ve been some nut job who thought, “Start them young.” You’d think it was someone in the military that thought of this group. I mean, can the outfits they put on those kids be any uglier? Definitely some sort of fashion sadist.

It was here that I got my first taste of sales. And it was sweeter than any Peanut Butter Patty could ever be. The Girl Scouts took me from being a nice little kid to a “hungry, bare knuckled, who do I have to climb over to get this sale” sales woman at the age of ten. And I know, I’m not the only one.

When cute Steffy Miller joined our troop, she was a quiet little thing. Her voice was barely above a whisper. She didn’t go to our school. She knew no one. Then she started being successful at selling the cookies and something happened.

Actually she never sold a thing. She was one of the lucky kids whose parents took the cookies to their jobs and sold boat loads of them easily. Cookie season after cookie season, Steffy Miller was the top sales person for our troop. Each time she got to the top, she became hungrier to keep her title. Crazy with power from being the top cookie sales producer, she became aggressive. Shy, pre-selling the cookies, now she was basically screaming “Koom Ba Ya” at us. In: a little girl. Out: an animal. Success can do that.

Steffy Miller was number one, and I was number two. Every time. I was one of the unlucky kids. My parents thought I should sell the cookies myself. Work ethic. Yawn. I guess there is something to be said for work ethic and all, but it didn’t seem fair. Steffy Miller and her stupid parents with their stupid jobs selling the cookies easily, while I had to do everything myself. But this time I wanted to be number one. She had to be stopped.

My troop leader was a hippie mother who was always pregnant. She wore the same shirt, potentially every day, because every time we had a meeting she was wearing it. It said, “Pregnant” with a picture of an arrow going down to her belly button. I guess she didn’t want anyone to think she was just fat.

My BFF (Best Friend Forever), even though she wasn’t a girl scout, came around and helped me sell. The first week of selling cookies was great. I worked really hard hoping to get a jump on my competition. Me and my BFF had a great time. Goofing around and pimping out our cute smiles to sell cookies. At my weekly troop meeting, “Pregnant” kept a tally on a big piece of oak paper with the number of boxes each girl sold. I was at 47 while Steffy Miller already had 90. Damn those parents!

I needed to think. If I wanted to outsell that horrible Miller family, I needed to cover more ground. Maybe me and my BFF should separate thereby selling twice as many cookies. I’d need two order forms at least. The only person who got more than one form was Steffy Miller. “Pregnant” guarded those forms like birth control. I waited for a diversion, which usually came in the form of one of their dogs going nuts, and when “Pregnant” wasn’t looking, I grabbed a stack. This wasn’t about fun anymore. It was about selling the shit out of those cookies.

TO BE CONTINUED...