Jennifer Long
*1974 Comox, British Columbia - CND

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The candy series

The idea of a sweet treat was first conceived of by cavemen who ate honey from beehives. From then on, children - of all ages - have never been able to resist the delightful urge of candy. We are surrounded by sweets from an early age, through convenience stores, holiday traditions (Christmas, Easter, Hannukah, Halloween, etc.), children’s stories (Hansel and Gretel, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory), rewards for being good, amusement park cotton candy, candy apples, and more cotton candy, baking with Mom… Most of us grow up equating candy with fun, comfort, goodness, reward and love. In fact, the human liking for sweetness is so desired by our palate that parents are told, when introducing solid food into their baby's diet, not to give them bananas (often the first sweet food given an infant) until they've acquired a taste for vegetables because once you've acquired a taste for sweetness, it's hard to develop a taste for anything else!
Even a child’s first experience with money often involves candy: running off to the corner store to buy sweets immediately after receiving one’s allowance. (It is also often the first time a child breaks the law - shoplifting candy.) And then on to selling Girl Guide cookies, and chocolate bars and chocolate-covered almonds to raise funds for one's school or organization.
 

This desire for sweets does not fade as we age. Since the discovery of sugar beet juice and technological advances made in the early nineteenth century, candy has become a very lucrative business. According to the American National Confectioners Association, Americans over the age of eighteen consume 65 percent of the candy produced each year. And it’s no surprise that there’s a billion-dollar weight-loss industry in North America. Of course there are also more enjoyable associations such as "sweet"hearts presenting shiny red heart-shaped boxes of chocolates on Valentine's Day as a token of love and lust. And let’s not forget the combination of candy and sex: whipped cream, edible underwear, flavoured body lotions and chocolate body paint.
Even religion uses the wonderful taste of sweetness to explain how divine faith can be. In the Old Testament, the desire for and realization of God was explained as sweet and sweetness. Psa. 119:103 How sweet are thy words unto my taste! Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!' Even today, the 'taste' of God can be explained to a child as 'sweet.' If your family practices any kind of 'dessert fast' - on Monday's, Wednesday's and Friday's, or every day of Lent - the symbolism of communion with God as sweetness is doubly emphasized.
 

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