For those with a sore throat, a friend
While in Vermont recently, I fell ill. Something was going around, and I got it. There was, as a local had said driving us into town a week earlier, one of everything where I would be staying, and I walked to the only grocery store to get drugs, feverish and wondering if someone had put a hex on me. Notoriously indecisive when it comes to such purchases, I lingered in the drug aisle for some time. I had nearly made a decision, when far from the endcap of hanging bags of cough drops, I spotted a box of Fisherman’s Friend Original Extra Strong lozenges. Drawn in by their relatively few ingredients and utilitarian packaging—the white box, its lettering and drawing of a boat in red and black ink—and the fact that they were completely foreign to me, I made my choice.