The story behind "TOOTHPICK"

I myself was grasping at straws upon why I decided on this title so quickly, especially one so strange and frivolous as "Toothpick". Usually it takes ages to find a name to commit to, and yet this one came so easily.

Maybe I shouldn't post this, try to let any readers develop theories to figure it out. However, I feel that at least it is worth it to collect my thoughts about such a title. Starting with research:

The History of the Toothpick is a strange one. Once objects of luxury adorned with jewels and the reason for the native's pearly whites, it was a man named Charles Foster, Marketing Genius™ who started it's cheap wooden mass production and essentially tricked his way into putting them in every single damn household. First personally asking small stores to supply his wooden pick product and them refusing, he turned to different measures, ergo, hiring young men to walk into the store and ask for toothpicks, and upon hearing that they do not supply the item, would leave in a fit of rage at the fact that "how can such a fine establishment such as yours not have this item so essential to my daily living???" So the retailers relented when our beloved Mr. Foster returned the next day with toothpicks bought readily right from his hands (he then sent his hired help back later to reinforce the idea, actually making them buy them, to which they'd return it to him so that he could sell them again). He then hit up restaurants, to which he'd get customers to, after finishing their meals, demand toothpicks, and cause even more uproar when they were informed the restaurant had none.

His tricks worked, and soon enough, the toothpick habit with the intention of teeth cleaning was wildly circulated among the public. A moment of applause for this guy Just goes to show that entrepreneurship will always work if you lie hard enough and have at least enough money to hire a couple good actors.

Gotta say, I'm glad for that guy. Toothpicks today are convenient tools used for a lot of things, poking into fruit, poking into teeth, arts and crafts projects, holding sandwiches together and spearing tiny things just for the heck of it.

It was while spearing pieces of crab and green onion slices onto toothpicks in preparation to be fried with my mom did I learn the Korean word for toothpick to be "이쑤시개" (pronounced "is-su-shi-gae"). Being the first new vocab word in a while for me, when I picked up attempting to learn Korean again, it stuck. And the comic's relation to wanting to be a vessel to learn Korean as well, I suppose the memory of that word really came on strong. It's not a bad name, but when telling my friends and pitching my ideas, it always came down to "why 'Toothpick'?"

While it never may be completely or accurately explained, it doesn't even really have a reason at all, I still hoped that maybe there was some kind of deeper meaning to penetrate through. So of course, turning back to my favourite site in sixth grade that I eventually deemed as pseudo-science, a dream dictionary contained my fallback in this search for relevance to my title. And what do you know?: a shy and soft-to-rarely-spoken nine year-old, while pretty young, is definitely one to be "picky", dwelling on "minor flaws, faults and small issues" whether in herself or the world around her. As well, having words stuck in your throat is something everyone's related to at some point in their lives, tying into the toothpick's second meaning of just that, "an inability to verbalize some emotion or feeling".

So as progress on this comic continues, I hope we can all hold some of this symbolism in mind once we finally see this thing take flight and maybe there will be even more reason for this tiny wooden stick to pop up in the story.

Hope you enjoyed! Stay saltful!

- r.k.

#toothpick