Writing Off Chocolate

It has been raining here. Now, this is Scotland, so a sentence like that is really redundant, but even the old-timers here admit that this summer's rain is excessive. The radiators are groaning under the weight of our wet laundry -- with three generally active teenagers we keep them well supplied -- and I seem to spend half my time wiping down the front porch, where from the looks of things we seem to have opened up a used shoe and umbrella store.

This rain means that I can get a lot of writing done. Unfortunately, it also means that if I want to do any walking or gardening, I'll end up in mud from head to toe. I look at our exhausted radiators, festooned with steaming towels, countless undergarments, rivers of socks -- and decide to stay indoors.

And unable to walk or go out into my garden to dig up flower beds or tend my herbs, I get bored. And when I get bored, I get hungry. Specifically, I get hungry for chocolate.

Logic tells me I don't need it -- what I need is a walk. But damn it, I want it. And sometimes desires get so strong that they can pound logic right into the ground. This is one of those times.

I know every single place in this house where chocolate might be. Like a junkie sniffing out a fix, like a nicotine addict desperate for a cigarette, like an alcoholic trying to dry out, I know where the stuff is kept. I've gotten down on my hands and knees and peered into dark cupboards where I once stored a nest of Easter eggs and forgot all about them until Christmas. I've dragged a kitchen chair across the floor and stood on my tiptoes, scouting the tops of the cupboards for stray chocolate bars. I've ruffled through the books and magazines, hoping for a bit of forgotten secret stash (not likely in that we've barely been back a month, but my need is stronger than logic), and I've been through the linen cupboard, dish towel by dish towel.

But there is no chocolate in this house. No baking chocolate, no foil-wrapped pieces of candy bars, no forgotten after-dinner-chocolate-covered mints, not even powdered cocoa.

So I go back to my writing and amazingly, I do good work, even in the absence of chocolate. I work until I've done over half of my daily quota, so I decide I've earned myself a tea break. On my way to the kitchen, I spot it on top of the linen cupboard in the hallway: a beautifully wrapped box, the red ribbon stretched tight over crisp white and gold paper. And I vaguely remember my daughter receiving this as a late birthday gift, leaving it on the kitchen table. I remember putting it on top of the linen cupboard where I often stash abandoned items that happen to be in my way when I'm cooking.

And there it has stayed, unneeded, forgotten.

Now we don't just have lust for chocolate beating down logic, we have lust for chocolate beating down moral scruples. Is it right for me to open my daughter's birthday gift just because I'm desperate for a fix? Yes, the chocolate-fueled demon in me says, because remember, you made her a birthday cake AND sushi; you did all the washing up and had all her friends over and remember what a mess they made in the lounge? You cleaned that all up with hardly a whimper of protest. Go on and open that box -- you've earned it!

And the part of me that is still good and decent and able to withstand the pull of chocolate says, Don't do it, look at that box -- it's special. Somebody picked that out for her and her alone, not you. You can't open it.

And the chocolate-lusting demon reminds me that she's forgotten it for almost an entire week, and my better angel tells me that whether she's forgotten it or not doesn't matter, and back and forth they go -- and I am torn between these two.

And finally, after I've finished my cup of tea, I can no longer bear it: I decide to see just what is inside that box. What it is that has kept me wondering, hoping, seething with chocolate greed. Because a peek can't hurt, can it? I gently ease one side of the ribbon off -- I'll be able to put it back on later -- and find: a box full of tiny bottles of shampoo.

Both of my angels are so disgusted by the depravity of putting shampoo in a chocolate box that they vanish in a puff of outrage, just like that.

Chocolate deprived, but blissfully free of temptation, I go back and finish my writing.