Dear Hostess

When I first learned of your impending closure I thought “well, this will be good for me.  Less tempting sugar and processed foods is better for me in the long run.”  I kind of celebrated your demise as a win.  I continued on with life without much thought about it.

But then I saw a couple of pictures on facebook of the “last box of Twinkies” being bought from the local grocery store.  From somewhere inside of me a little bit of panic began to well up (and I made a mental note of the guy who bought that last box of Twinkies and his home address).  Would I really not be able to get a spongy, cream filled log of goodness?  Would I never again feel the completeness of being able to scrape the bottom of my Twinkie off that white piece of cardboard?  Are the days of sipping concentrated dew from the mountains contained in a 44oz plastic cup while flipping an apple pie over to bite the corner with the most filing actually over?

I started stopping at all my regular haunts just to check to see if they had any Hostess left.  No one did.  The panic began to swell up even more.  Even that 7-11 in the next town over, on that back street, in that one neighborhood that no one knows about, that doesn’t even sell gas was out!

As time passed I began to accept my fate and the fate of all mankind.  I realized that my kids will grow up never having carefully removed the frosting top from a chocolate cup cake.  They won’t know the exhilaration of finding a clump of crystallized crumbles at the bottom of a pack of crumble donettes.  And I might never know why, every time I bit into an apple pie, I always bit into the side with a pocket of air instead of filling!

I tried to replace you.  I bought the 7-11 brand version of the chocolate cup cake.  It was disgusting, not even close.  It pained me to finish it.  I even started noticing things that would remind me of you.  The faint glint of silvery tin foil suddenly looked like a treasured Ding Dong ready to be rescued. 

I’d been doing well, stopping less and less at the Chevron station.  Even my dew from the mountains consumption was down.  I even began to feel better, making real progress.  But then it all came crashing down.

After one particularly difficult day at work I stopped in for the ultimate in screw-it-all treats.  The holy grail of a sweet, glutinous reward; the 6 pack of raspberry filled, white powered, full sized donuts.  I scanned the shelf quickly, not seeing them.  “No big deal, they are sometimes hard to find,” I thought to myself when I didn’t see them in that one spot on the bottom shelf.  I kept looking.  They weren’t on the next row either.  My heart started beating faster and a drop of sweat formed on my forehead.  I looked up quickly at George, the store clerk, with a hint of desperation in my eyes.  He noticed me but was busy with the taquitos.  I moved to the next aisle, nothing.  Only one aisle left and it was the one against the window. “But that’s the aisle with all the car stuff”, I thought, “Could they possibly have moved them over there?”  My heart sank as I stepped around the corner to see nothing but gas cans, oil additives and ibuprofen.  I looked up at George again, my heart beating in my ear drums, and walked to the counter.  Controlling my voice so as not to give away the emotions welling up inside me I slowly, calmly asked, “hey George, hey man, uh…where are the raspberry filled donuts?  You guys move ‘em or sumpthin?”

The words were spoken in slow motion. 

“Dude, we don’t get those anymore, I think the company went out of business or something.”

“No” I thought “no, the raspberry donuts aren’t made by Hostess, they are made by…by…”

But inside I knew it was true, they were made by Hostess and they were gone.  I ran out of the store, before George could see the tears welling up.  I drove home fast.  It was dark and raining, fitting weather to mourn and curse the unions or bad management or whatever it was that had closed this door on my life.

And now I curse you too Hostess.  Curse you for making such wonderful treats and then pulling them away from us.  Curse you for not giving us more warning.  Curse you for failing to innovate so that more and more of us would buy more of your processed goods.

But if you ever come back, please let me know asap.  Thanks!

Jared McInelly