One of the great treats I had when I was a kid was soda pop. There was a bottler in my hometown -- Oil City, PA -- named Gowdy's. Once in a while, my father would get a case of soda pop -- 24 glass bottles in a rough wooden case, all which would be returned for deposit (a concept long lost, to society's detriment) . Father always insisted on an assortment of sodas -- Cola, of course, grape, root beer, ginger ale, orange and my favorite, the very rare birch beer. Sometimes where would be a substitutions -- soda that was red or green or yellow.

We never took the last of any one flavor without asking permission. And if the last one was cream soda, I suddenly wasn't all that thirsty.

But Gowdy's set the benchmark against which I have judged all other sodas in my life. Now we get soda from a cut-rate grocery store, twelve flimsy aluminum cans, all the same flavor, no exotic choices except diet or "high test." My favorite now is root beer. It compares favorably with Gowdy's -- good color, good flavor, nice froth when poured over ice. It wins my seal of approval.