Expired Hope

A new year brings a miasma of hope but also a tickle of regret. I feel optimistic for what I may accomplish in 2015 but also rue what I never had the chance to do in 2014.

Nowhere is this truer than in my envelope of now-expired coupons. Every week I clip these from the paper in a quest to save cents and dollars at the supermarket. Last Thursday, as midnight struck, I permanently lost the chance to take advantage of these savings. At the crack of dawn on New Year’s Day, as I rooted through the expired coupons, I glanced at a world of savings that might have been, had I only been more vigilant.

There are not one but two coupons for $3 off a pack of Gillette Mach 3 razor blades, now lost to history. I could have had those razors stockpiled beneath the sink. Granted, I use them at a steady rate but you never know when my beard might start coming in at an accelerated Sasquatch rate and I would need more. Now I risk running out. Shaving cream was also $1 off but now all those savings are lost like tears in the rain.

I could have taken advantage of the enormous nutritional power of pomegranate seeds, with several coupon for Pom products. Alas, until they reissue the coupons, I will be stuck paying full price for pomegranates like a sucker.

Oh, the surfaces I could have Swiffed with coupons for Swiffers and the Swiffer Wet Jet totaling in excess of $5. I could have bought two Tides for $3 off and Downy for 20 cents off. I should have noted the “expires 12/31/14” at the top and not just whistled a carefree tune in the mistaken belief that my discount on cleaning products would never die.

Think of all the bulk food I could have bought. Weeping, I see obsolete coupons for 40 cents off two jars of Ragu and 50 cents off (really $1 since Acme doubles it) a 16.5-ounce jar of mayo. Now how am I going to host that dinner party I’d planned with two lasagnas and 17 egg salad sandwiches?

Tragically, I can only bake at full price, with coupons for Karo corn syrup and all manner of yeast and baking powder gone like the dodo that 2014 has become. Now people will have to choke down my cakes and pies knowing that my subpar confectionary ability cost full price.

Oh, what I could have saved; what I could have stockpiled! We will never know how much richer I could have been had I just paid more attention. My resolution for 2015 writes itself.