July 10, 2003 - 12:48 p.m.
A friend sent me an email today expressing the wish that they would bring back pull tabs on beer cans. (The origin of that email was from a story on the retro nature of Pabst Blue Ribbon.)
This is how I responded.
Your mention of pull tabs took me back to the age of 5. My babysitter would drink Tab, which, along with its petroleum flavor, came with pull tabs. I was constantly warned from playing with them because she and my grandma were convinced I would amputate my own finger with it. (I had an incident when I was 3 where I got a Christmas ornament hook lodged in my index finger, which I think made them irrationally wary of sharp things and my fingers in close proximity.) I longed to play with the pull tab, something about wanting what we cannot have, I'm sure. The style of soda cans changed to the pop-top, and pull tabs disappeared from the market. I never have been able to play with the lovely teardrop-shaped pull tab that I so craved as a child. Alas, with lawsuits as they are these days, I probably never will. Instead, I will have to satisfy myself with ring-enhanced lids on Campbell's ready-to-eat soup and the like, or even better, the way cans of corned beef open.
I didn't realize I had so many issues with packaging and sharp objects!
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