The Fat Diaries: Why Must We Celebrate With Sweets?
Wednesday was the first day of school for my brood. This is the first year that I would be sending both kids to preschool and have 3 hours to work or run errands without little guys in tow. Just for the hell of it, I had decided to do nothing that day–absolutely nothing. I got a haircut for the first time in four months, and browsed every nearby store that I’d been too afraid to enter with grabby kids (i.e., the kind that sold glass items on low shelves).
I was bored to tears after 40 minutes. Scented candles and pricey electronics are only moderately entertaining, especially if you’re on a limited budget. Unwittingly I found that my feet were taking me to a dangerous place, one that continues to test me to my very core: the grocery store. I had nothing I needed to buy inside, I couldn’t even make up an excuse to go in, like “We could always use more paper towels.” That’s how much I didn’t need to go in.
The truth was that I was starving. The kids’ new school schedule meant that lunch was now about 2 hours earlier than usual, and being a late breakfaster, I wasn’t hungry at 11:00. I’m ashamed to admit that I was going in purely to see if the bakery was handing out free cookies.
Once I was in the bakery, and staring at the beautiful gooey chocolate cakes, I felt a warm delightful realization. I had a reason to celebrate. I had just gotten good news that morning from my publisher. After nearly ten months and a lot of grey hairs, my debut fantasy novel, “Must Love Dragons” was finally on sale!
One thought and one thought alone was screaming in my brain: I need to buy a cake to celebrate! I had a mental image of my family smiling and clapping as I sat in front of a fancy gateau with “congratulations” written in icing on top. The vision in my head was only a little more saccharine than an actual cake.
I browsed the racks and racks of beautifully frosted cakes and debated which I should buy. Looking at the price tags, I was a little cowed and decided to buy a Duncan Hines box of cake mix. It’d have the same amount of chemicals and would cost about $15 less. I stared at the boxes of mix, trying to choose, when I felt guilt gnawing at my insides. Did I really need to make a big cake covered in frosting? I remembered that my husband was missing dinner that night. I also remembered that one of my kids doesn’t even LIKE cake. That left a gigantic double-decker 8 inch diameter cake to serve to two people, and the rest to sit in the fridge for a week. I knew that said fridge-cake would be slowly devoured by me over the course of the week.
I couldn’t do that to myself! Hadn’t someone just the day before remarked how good I was looking these days? I couldn’t derail it all because I wanted a celebration cake! I started to wrestle with my guilty conscience and my ability to rationalize. It was seriously like the Angel & Devil gags they do in cartoons.
Okay (my devil reasoned) maybe cake was a bit much. Maybe I could just make a pan of brownies. Brownies with no icing. Even the picky “I don’t like sweets” kid liked brownies, and I could simply put the rest in a Ziploc bag. Riiiight. My angel reminded me that the last pan of brownies I made lasted all of 3 hours. The majority were eaten by me in a “just one more” mentality coupled with selective amnesia.
“What about one of the boxes of brownie mix that are low-calorie?” asked the devil. Angel reminded me that I never liked those, except that one time I switched out the fat-free yogurt for a cup of chocolate pudding. My devil gave up on the brownies, but not on the sweets idea. I wandered through the bakery and dairy isle looking longingly at the streusels, donuts and cheesecakes. I was looking for something– ANYTHING that would appease my desire to celebrate with the desire to avoid gorging. Nothing seemed suitable. Every super-sized treat, every goody, would stay around for days either being consumed or tormenting me in the fridge!
For a celebratory occasion I was suddenly feeling very miserable. At this point I was eyeing the fat-free frozen yogurt and weight-watchers snack cakes without much enthusiasm. I decided (since I still had another hour to kill) to stop and think about what was going through my head. I had reached a wonderful landmark in my career, and my mind automatically jumped to sweets. Had my brain always made that connection? Had I been pre-conditioned to equate celebration with mindless gorging? I started to replay all the lies I told myself in my head. “It’s alright! It’s a special occasion!” “One more slice, it’s a special occasion!”
I began to see the hidden connection. I wasn’t looking for a way to celebrate my debut novel. I was looking for a reason to disregard all common knowledge and eat. I could have gotten a single cookie, or a donut at the bakery and added (maybe) 170 calories to my day, but instead my brain wanted me to swan dive into a sugary feeding frenzy, and a “special occasion” cheated my brain into thinking it was okay.
Why do I need to celebrate with food? Why can’t I celebrate with a new pair of jeans, or some trendy rain boots (I really need a pair of rain boots). Well for one thing, it’s because a box of cake mix is $1.78 and cute rain boots cost upwards of $30. Food is a much cheaper, simpler way to have a ball. This is something I have to work out, though. I have a lot to be happy and grateful for, and if I turn every triumph, every milestone passed, into a “special occasion,” complete with cake, it’s going to cost me.
I felt wretched as I marched out of the store, empty-handed with my stomach growling in protest. I decided a hot cup of coffee would hit the spot and went to the in-store chain. As I filled my cup I saw a bakery box near the carafe; it was stuffed with donuts. In morbid curiosity, I asked an employee if the donuts were for something special (like voters or blood donors). She said, “No. We just give you a free donut if you buy a cup of coffee.” A light went on. One donut. Not a giant cake, or a huge pan of brownies, or a cheesecake the size of a truck tire. One donut–that’s all I needed– and a really good cup of coffee. I consumed them in my van, blasting ABBA, while sitting in the parking lot.
The attendance of my first “launch celebration” was depressingly low, but the refreshments were excellent.
