The Easter season is here and it’s time for retailers to dust off their old inventory of Halloween, Christmas and Valentine’s Day candy for the last of the sugar-laced holidays.

For candies with some staying power, like lollipops, jelly beans and gumdrops, they can’t really mold the candies in a specific holiday’s colors; they have to stick to the tried-and-true standards: green, yellow, orange, et cetera. Fast-movers like M & Ms can go seasonal with lavender and white and not fear that a retailer will still have them on the shelf come next Halloween. But today my focus is on gumdrops.

Sitting at my desk this morning waiting for the coffee to brew, I had a craving for gumdrops. Why? Who knows. Maybe because I haven’t had any in years. I’ve had jelly beans, Skittles, Hot Tamales, Mike and Ike’s and things of that nature, but I haven’t had gumdrops for quite some time. This may seem odd, but I remember I like sucking on gumdrops. On a recent trip to Arizona, I sucked on Hot Tamales. Have you ever done that? What a huge disappointment. Once the fire-red coating is gone you’re left with a translucent rod of tasteless hard gel. Suck the coating off a jelly bean and it essentially becomes a spoonful of gritty jam. Gumdrops are different.

If you have an oral fixation, gumdrops are the best. You can bite them, chew them, suck them, mash them with your tongue, whatever. Unlike M & Ms, Nerds or Red Hots, you can’t stick a handful of them in your mouth and “wing it.” One, maybe two, gumdrops and you’re set for a while. That may be why they have much longer staying power than some of the other goodies out there. But I’m speaking from ancient history, not recent experience.

I realized that in lieu of gumdrops I’ve substituted a chew stick. You might call it a plastic coffee stirrer, but to me it’s a chew stick. I don’t smoke so the stick isn’t a substitute for that activity. My favorites are the single-barrel, small caliber brown or red sticks. I’ll pass on the wood (too utilitarian) and the double-barreled hard black ones. Sometimes I’ll go for a larger caliber paper-wrapped stick from an AM/PM, but those are too much like straws. Straws are not chew sticks: they’re straws.

When not in use, I can secure a chew stick in my shirt pocket. I guess I’ll have to give the edge to the chew stick over the gumdrop in that category. If I’m well into a good “chaw” while working out some Boolean logic on an Excel spreadsheet and the phone rings, I can reach for the phone and remove the chew stick in one deft movement. You can’t do that with a gumdrop. If I had a gumdrop in my mouth I’d probably just let the phone ring. Priorities, you know.

Chew sticks have a lifespan and I guess “chew” would be a misnomer. I like to bite down just enough to feel the plastic give. Rotate the stick 12-1/2 degrees, bite down slightly and it’ll give again. Repeat for hours. I don’t know how to describe it. I have rules. I never bite all the way down because the stick has to retain its round shape. Sometimes I’ll inhale through it just because, but I never exhale through it–it’s not a snorkel. I only use one half of the stick because my fingers have been touching the other half while I’ve been rotating it around. I’ll flavor the stick by stirring my coffee (a novel concept) but if the coffee’s gone and the stick has lost its flavor, I toss it. That’s not true. If I know I’ll be having coffee later, I’ll tuck it in my shirt pocket (chew-side down, always) until I get a refill. Since I drink coffee all day, it’s usually not that long before I refill and continue. But what about the gumdrops?

Gumdrops don’t really have a lifespan because you can move from one to the other almost immediately. Another bonus: each one has its own flavor. Seriously, I love the flavor of coffee but it gets old after a while. If you get tired of the gumdrop you’re working on now you can take it out of your mouth and go to another one. If you’ve sucked a gumdrop for a while, you can bite it lightly and shape it. Come on, I’m not the only one that does this. If you bite it too hard you’ll ruin it. Bite it just enough and you can make it into a ball or see how long you can make it, like a piece of chewing gum. You know exactly what I’m talking about.

I prefer sucking on gumdrops because they get stuck in my teeth when I chew. You know, it could be that the longer you suck on them the stickier they get and that’s why I don’t get them anymore. I don’t remember. I’m certain it was a specific event that led to the gumdrop embargo/boycott, whatever, but I don’t remember what it was. All I know is that today I really want a gumdrop and I know I won’t get one. I won’t even see one. In fact, the truth is I don’t remember the last time I saw a real gumdrop. I’ve seen pictures of them, but it’s honestly been years since I’ve laid eyes on a real gumdrop, let alone enjoyed one.

Since I have a lot of work to do today the local CVS staff can rest assured I won’t be assaulting their facility looking to swoop in and take their cache of gumdrops. Maybe it’s the season or maybe I had a sudden sugar attack but my desire specifically for a gumdrop or two today went through the roof. Knowing me and my unwillingness to actually go out and get one I guess I’ll add one more packet of sweetener to my coffee and keep chewing on the chew stick.

But I really want a gumdrop.