Oscar: The Life of a Goldfish Cracker

My name is Oscar and I'm one of the 142 billion Goldfish crackers that are created each year.

Life as a Goldfish is nice, it's a simple life and I always have a smile on my face. Even though the world is going through a terrible time right now with the COVID-19 pandemic and other such things, I keep a smile on my face, I stay optimistic, I know that everything will be okay in the end. I know my goal in life is for someone to look down at my smiling face while they hold me in the palm of their hand, perhaps alone or surrounded by a few of my brothers and sisters. I hope them looking down on my smile will bring a smile to their own face and then they too will know that everything will be alright in the end.

My family consist of many different colors and flavors and our family history goes back sixty-three years to the year 1958 where we were created at Kambly, a biscuit manufacturer in Switzerland. Our creator, Oscar J. Kambly, my namesake, created our original salty-flavored ancestors as a birthday gift for his wife, who was a Pisces, which is often represented in Greek mythology as a fish, hence our shape. We were then brought to America by Margaret Rudkin, the founder of Pepperidge Farm in 1962 after she vacationed in Europe, loved us, and reached an agreement with our creator to bring our ancestors to America.

Our first, American, ancestors came in five flavors, Lightly Salted (Original), Cheese, Barbecue, Pizza, and Smoky, then four years later, in 1966, our most popular flavor, Cheddar Cheese, which I consist of, was introduced. However, it wasn't until 1997 that we started receiving our smiles, which about 40% of us have, and became "The Snack That Smiles Back."

While we started as a humble family, with only five flavors, we now have a growing, yet still humble family, of more than two dozen flavors. While many of my sisters and brothers don't have the same "iconic" smile that I do, their main purpose in life is the same, to make people smile.

Life for me began like many of my bother and sisters, in the "Goldfish capital of the world, Willard, Ohio. I was one of the nearly fifty million Goldfish crackers made on September 14, 2021. First, my ingredients were combined, salt, sugar, yeast, and cheese, just to name a few. Then I sat for hours rising, I then went through some rollers, got pressed down, got shaped and given my smile, baked for a few minutes, dried, oiled, and finally packaged, where I'll wait with several hundred others until it's time for me to make someone smile.

Our package, along with other similar packages, each containing hundreds of my brothers and sisters will be placed inside a box, then loaded on a pallet with other boxes just like ours, then loaded on a truck, full of pallets, just like ours. After traveling for a while our box will be taken off the truck, then off the pallet, and placed inside a smaller truck to make our way to a store where our package will be taken out of the box and placed on a shelf, awaiting someone to pick our package up, put us in their cart and take us home.

Our package will finally be opened and we will see our new home for the first time. Some of us will make our way into school lunchboxes, others into snack bowls at parties, or in someone's bed as a late-night snack.

You might think my life is boring, you might think it's short and bleak but it's not. As a Goldfish, I have a purpose, as do all of my brothers and sisters. Our mission in life is to make others smile, just like we do.

While not all of my brothers and sisters have a smile, that is their goal too. You might not see a smile, but there is one hiding on the inside hoping to see yours. Our purpose is our mission and our mission drives us, it makes our life great, that's why we’re "The Snack That Smiles Back."

So here's my mission to you. If a tiny Goldfish cracker, like myself, can look up and smile at everyone, why can't you? Why can't you look at all of the bad situations in your life and say "It will be okay, I will get through this."

Stay optimistic my friend, everything will work out, everything will be okay. Go through life and become the "The Person That Smiles Back," no matter the situation.

Be the person that smiles back.

—

If you enjoyed reading this please consider hitting the heart, subscribing to read my future articles, and leaving a tip, all of which would be greatly appreciated.

If you know anyone that would find value in this article, please share it with them.

Thanks so much for reading.