The
new year has always been a struggle, grappling with all the avoirdupois I packed on during the
holidays. But now, in a cruel twist of fate,
Girl Scout cookies are showing up in January.
IS
THIS A PLOT????
It used to be that hordes of badgey-vested
cuties would come around in January and take orders for cookies to be delivered
in March. You didn’t mind ordering a box from each of them because the Girl
Scouts are a good cause, and besides, you were sure you would have lost all
that holiday heft by then and a box of Girl Scout cookies would be a nice
reward. Just one. The rest, you promised yourself, you’d send to the kids. Not, of course, that you ever did.
When
the first Girl Scout showed up at my house on January 24, I started to give her
my usual order – a box of Thin Mints (like there are actually any other kind) -
when I noticed the red wagon behind her loaded with cookies. At first I thought these were just the
samples. But no, the child’s mother
explained, now you get to take possession on the spot.
I
don’t think the Girl Scouts have thought this through. Yeah, I know you can opt to send the cookies
to our service personnel abroad so it’s not as though you’re required to oink
out on them yourself. But it has just thrown
off my whole system: Order now, repent
later.
I
would like to take this opportunity to say that I have not always suffered from
embonpoint. (The French have so many great words for
fat.) Prior to my divorce, I was always
a size four, which in today’s deflationary weight currency is a size two or
even a zero. (Frankly, I think size zero
should be what you are after you’ve been dead a while.) Unfortunately, I put on forty pounds eating
the Post-Divorce Depression Diet (sample dinner: three Mrs. Fields cookies,
half bottle Chablis). I still think of
myself as temporarily overweight, that this extra adipose is a mere blimp, er,
blip in an otherwise svelte life. So you
can imagine how shocked I was recently to realize that the divorce was twenty-nine
years ago.
If
I were to be completely honest, I would have to admit that in my case,
chocolate has been a serious life-long addiction. I have no doubt that at my funeral, the many
massively unflattering chocolate-related stories about me will be recounted by
my husband and children. I keep meaning
to write up my own versions and attach them to my will so that people will understand
that there were extenuating circumstances.
That leaping upon my startled ten-year-old and shoving my fist half way
down his esophagus to retrieve my Mrs. Field’s cookie was a reasonable act.
You
just don’t take someone else’s cookie.
Especially after you have already had your own designated cookie and the
other party, an overstressed single mother, has been saving hers all evening on
a little plate to have as a reward after all her chores are done. And how the other party was finally ready to
enjoy her cookie only to discover an empty plate and the last vestiges of her well-deserved treat (and marginal sanity)
disappearing into the mouth of someone sitting on the sofa watching TV. But I’m sure my son will never mention all
that. He will just tell how, as my fist
was entering his intestinal tract, I was screaming “GIVE ME THE &*%$##
COOKIE!!!!!!” I really must get my own
versions out there while there’s still time, although frankly, I’m not sure
even I can save that story.
Sadly,
Girl Scout Thin Mint cookies have a similar effect on me as Mrs. Field’s. I open a sleeve and it disappears into thin (mint)
air right before my eyes. Last year
during Girl Scout cookie season, I awoke one morning to find a note on the
counter from Olof: “Inga – Rats have
gotten into the Girl Scout cookies again.
Better call Pest Control or there aren’t going to be any left for
you!”
Well,
probably the only saving grace about Girl Scout cookies coming out in January
is that I can now have the illusion that I will lose all the holiday heaviness
AND my cookie chunké before Easter
when all those wonderful Cadbury eggs and chocolate bunnies fairly shout out my
name. I just wish they would lower the
decibels.
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