I've been thinking of things that have long since disappeared that were current earlier in my life and I'm wondering if anyone out there is old enough to remember some of them. In no apparent order:

Chen Yu nail polish - first time I ever saw dark green or black on fingernails. Common now, but the brand is gone.

Ben Hur perfume, in a darling little blue bottle. I was too young to wear it but we had a maid who did. (A maid was a hired girl who lived in.)

Liquid stockings. During the War (World War Two, darling) all the silk and later, - I think it was invented then - nylon, was going to parachutes and women had to wear ugly thick lisle stockings. (I was still in long underwear and black stockings and navy bloomers.) So women spread stocking-coloured liquid on their bare legs (after shaving) and the more artistic even drew a seam down the back of their legs with an eyeliner pencil. In Winnipeg this was pretty courageous because it was very cold in the winter. I wonder how many of those women ended up with kidney trouble from getting their legs so chilled.

"The Chinese Room". This was a very daring, sexy book that went the rounds, falling open at the juicy parts. I think I read it but I don't remember any of it. I do remember reading Marcia Davenport's "Valley of Decision" and being astonished when I read "his hand lay firm and quiet on her breast." On her breast!! Wow. Did people do that?

My mother allowed me to read "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" but she censored it/me. She put book marks in pages that I was not supposed to read. Of course, I read them, and was disgusted with a flasher who showed his ugly thing to Francie. Was it crawling with maggots or did I make that up? Years later this "banned" book showed up on a granddaughter's reading list. That, too, was a shock. Things keep changing.

I'm trying to remember when fresh garlic was first available. When I was married I used little bottles of garlic salt. Then there were little boxes with 2 dried-up garlic cloves. When could you buy fresh garlic by the pound? Lost in the mists of memory. Now I say that a day without garlic is like a day without sunshine.

My commuter just warned me I'm running out of power. I'll say.