Trash Bag Inspiration

This picture is on the wall of my refrigerator. It is an inspiration. I mean, just look at this woman. She is decidedly a ’50s lady, no doubt about it. Look at those pink stretch pants, that teased hair, all the pink in her colorful kitchen. She is who she is and she’s happy with that fact. The sun is shining through her kitchen window, she is striding purposely toward the door, smiling, her head lifted to meet the new day. She’s my kind of gal.

This ad impressed me so much that years ago, I wrote to the company that makes the trash bags. I had an idea for a marketing campaign. I would use this lady in different situations, always in the same pink stretch pants and frizzed hair, dealing with one challenge after the other. The caption would be something like, “These trash bags never spring a leak even when love goes wrong” or something like that.

Did the company write to me, grateful for my loyalty and overwhelmed by my creativity? Did they immediately offer to fly me to New York and employ me as the go-to person for future ads? Unbelievably, they sent me a cold, formal note saying they had their own people working on promotion, thank you. Huh!

However, I don’t hold grudges, so that clipping stayed on my refrigerator, continuing to inspire and uplift. When life begins to get me down and clouds cover the sun, I just glance at that confident woman marching into the day, able to deal with whatever comes along. Looking back at it the good parts of the 1950s, I remember a great deal of positivity and a can-do attitude. If the sun doesn’t shine, if storms threaten, if things don’t turn out exactly as I’d hoped, I gaze at my refrigerator–and am inspired.