Our Bovine World . . .

I read once that people who smoke may do so for the oral aspect because their mothers took away the baby bottle too soon! They need to do something with their mouth. If that were true, what is with all the people who can't get through their day without a wad of gum snapping to and fro in their mouths, punctuating their every word with the pops and explosions of well-used gum? Are there actually that many insecure people loose in the world today?

Gum has been around for ages and you don't think too much about a child happily enjoying the bright, pink bubble gum, trying to blow bubbles without inviting the participation of their hair.

I'm beginning to wonder, however, about all the active jaws that work their way through busy malls, grocery stores, the movies, and even church, a juicy wad of gum snapping and bouncing from cheek to cheek. It's getting to be like overlooking a hyper herd of cows busily working their cud. I suppose the younger set consider themselves 'cool' as they chomp out their conversation midst a clump of gum. It's the older people, the retirement crowd, that make me wonder what they are getting out of all the jaw action. The woman in front of me in line at the store today was close to seventy yet in spite of her carefully styled hair and perfect make up, she wanted to ruin the effect with her gum munching. She provided horrid fascination in the slow line at the check out counter. She would heft the gooey wad from one side to the other, snap down on it to provide an immense POP, suck down a bit, and repeat. Her layer of make up would powder off a bit as the action would heavily crease a wrinkle in the side of her face. It was mesmerizing and I would have drifted off if it weren't for the regular POP sound.

It must be contagious as I often see well-muscled jaws in studio audiences working the chewing gum. I particularly remember several episode of Dancing with the Stars when Billy Ray Cyrus was competing. They kept panning over the audience to show his daughter's reaction. Every, single time the camera closed in on Miley's face, you could actually see the huge wad of gum she had going. She might be an attractive girl. I couldn't say from the distration of the gum.

Not sure how gum crawled out of the school-aged crowd but it has certainly turned society into a herded community. And, like a herd of animals, their used up gum is often left for the soles of unsuspecting shoes.