Junk... and me, aged about 6

First, know this from the outset. I am not an Avon shopper. My mother was and there were certain things about Avon that I really liked when I was a child, but as an adult I've never been into Avon. My apologies to anyone who is for what follows because I'm sure that there are Avon products that are wonderful (or at least passable)... but Avon jewellery is complete crap.

I'd suspected that for a while (even a non-Avon shopper sees a catalogue now and then), but now I have even more proof to back my claim. Bought it anyway, but... oh, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

A while ago I was given a free "charm bracelet" key chain by the Avon representative at a trade show. I suppose it was meant as an incentive to order something, but it was rather the opposite. Cheap plastic beads and tacky charms don't generally leave a person begging for more of the same in my experience, and one has to wonder if that poor woman managed to make any sales after handing out her gifts.

My opinion of the jewellery was recently solidified when the local liquidator got in a supply of Avon. I have no idea why it was being liquidated (probably just old stock, since things seemed to be in decent condition), but seeing a whole bunch of the stuff together in one place certainly reinforced the aura of cheapness. Seriously. It's the worst of costume jewellery, as far as I could tell. Unabashedly plastic gemstones, unidentifiable metals (beware the world of "goldtone"), clunky designs... it must take a real artist to manage to photograph the things and make them look at all wearable in the catalogues. In person they're just scary.

And then I saw it.

"It" would be the tacky necklace you can see in the bottom of the photo above. And yes, I bought it. Plastic gems and all, I bought it.

Thank goodness it was liquidation-priced because I'll never wear it, but I had to buy it. It brought on too much of a childhood memory, you see.

The other things you see in the top photo are vintage 70s Avon brooches. My mother bought them for me when I was a child, and I loved them. Loved them so much that I kept them, obviously. And why did I love them? Partly because they're kind of cute, but mostly because they each have a SECRET!!! Here, this is what I mean:

Each one of the pins had a secret compartment that contained a scent. What scent? I can't remember now, but I'm pretty sure that they all would have had the same scent because I had a particular favourite as a kid. I want to say Sweet Honesty, but don't quote me on that (although it's amusing to me that I just looked it up on a perfume review site and the consensus seemed to be that it smelled somewhat like dryer sheets).

I'd hate to think that anyone ever bought one of those things for someone who wasn't a child, but for a kid they were, admittedly, fun. You could put on your jewellery just like mom, and you had your very own hidden perfume. The ironic thing is, of course, that as an adult I very rarely wear perfume since I work with kids and too many of them seem to have scent allergies nowadays...

Anyway. The end result is that when I saw that one of the junky-looking Avon necklaces had hidden compartments (not for dryer-sheet-smelling pomade, sadly. It's lip colour) I had to buy it just for old time's sake. And now it'll sit in the box with my other Avon jewellery.

Ah well. A couple of dollars was a small price to pay for a smile and a memory.

----------

Speaking of a smile and a memory, I meant to post something like this a few days ago but was too busy. Now, though, I have the chance. Good bye, Mary.