In Praise Of The Smaller Sized Pimento Stuffed Olive Jar And Other Superfluous Beauty

Woman in Cannery LOC 1920s US Food and Drug Administration

“The Nothing is spreading," groaned the first. 

"It's growing and growing, there's more of it every day, 

if it's possible to speak of more nothing. 

All the others fled from Howling Forest in time, but we didn't want to leave our home. 

The Nothing caught us in our sleep and this is what it did to us."

"Is it very painful?" Atreyu asked.

"No," said the second bark troll, the one with the hole in his chest.

"You don't feel a thing. There's just something missing.

And once it gets hold of you, something more is missing every day.

Soon there won't be anything left of us.”

― Michael Ende, The Neverending Story

I waited for over a month for the small size jar of the spanish palmento green olives to come back in stock at Food Lion. It is the cheaper per ounce green olive jar. I would glance over quickly looking for the vase shaped glass for months. When we finished off the jar this week, the loveliness of the jar hit me. The wider base that tapers to a smaller top, the decorative stripes, and the bottom has the slightest shade of green tint. I couldn't throw it away. I'm a highly visual person. This sensitivity could be a sign of peri-menopause. Or, maybe my people from the Old World of the 1980s remember the days of beauty and design everywhere. I don't like how generic everything in daily life has become. 

1960s Atomic Starburst jelly jar and generic green olive jar.

The tiniest hint of sea green bottom.

I come from people that saved pretty jars. My people kept and reused these jars. I grew up drinking from old jelly glasses covered with atomic starbursts, Garfield, or the Smurfs. There was beauty and color everywhere from galaxy bowling alley carpets to Christmas paper towels. This week while washing out this pretty jar to save, I realized that I don't see pretty jars anymore. I don't see shapes or colors. Everything is a cylinder. Everything is one color. Even our billing statements are becoming colorless or one color. Companies are getting rid of multicolored logos due to costs. Even our plain checks from the bank are no longer blue background but gray. Colors cost money, and money is all anyone thinks about in the New World. 

In the Old World of the 80s and the 90s, there were colors everywhere. People thought it was worth the extra money to spend on whimsy, pattern, and designs on everything. It was delightful. For example, the Taco Bell shown below was similar to the one I went to in high school. Actually, mine had additional colors in a Southwestern vibe-- peach, teal, and pink. Today's stripped down purple Taco Bell makes me sad. My people thought 10 colors for the fast food restaurant decor was worth the extra money. We were color ballers!

Taco Bell employees at the Barksdale Base Exchange recover from a busy lunch rush. 2011

Taco bell restaurant at 3502 W. 16th Street in Indianapolis, Indiana. May 2018. 

 Taco Bell Opens in WA. 2021

My people also loved shapes. We loved shapes in everything. I am sharing this in case these too will be replaced with a generic cylinder. Shapes cost money and the New World doesn't think shapes are worth it. The New World wants everything on a utilitarian flat screen. Everything is about the bottom line. I looked around my kitchen and found only a handful of shapes and textures. They stick out in my fridge and pantry. These are what remain from the past. These are artifacts of the Old World. I remember when everything had design. Do you remember the yellow mustard in a barrel shaped bottle? I think we took it for granted. 

David Holding Mustard Wikkicommons

On the left, two old glass juice bottles with pebbled texture and form. Today's plastic fake on right.

New lime juice, no longer in green plastic lime shaped. Now plastic wrapped label.
Front and back detail of honey bear. The hair on the back is precious. The detail. 

Two beautiful jars that will hold yard flowers. One from my childhood and one from today. So rare.

Olive Jar with Crape Myrtle buds & hydrangea. Frosted face lotion bottle with hydrangea.

Found mini liquor bottle with blanket flowers. Jelly jar with Crape myrtle & Lime Light cutting.

Where I come from, beauty was abundant. Beauty had value and was worth the extra money. That is why I praise this lovely olive jar, a jar with a little beauty and form. Both are rare qualities today. Anything beyond the absolute minimum is to be honored especially in a world of bean counting, bare bones, private equity slop. Do you remember?

Thank you for reading, and God bless you.

Paul Cézanne - Still Life with Flowers in an Olive Jar 1880