Love Versus Lust (a.k.a. Samoas v. Granny B's Pink Cookies of Death)

Oh, the composition of this blog post started off so differently than it's going to end up. That's one thing I really love about writing. Thinking you're going to write about one thing and then you get to the end and realize you have to rewrite the whole thing because you're last sentence was dynamite and the whole blog post should really be about that. Yeah, this is one of those.

This post is ultimately going to be about cookies and love.

And pink cookies and lust.

Let's start at the beginning.

There was an...incident in the kitchen the other night. It was Taco Tuesday and I thought as a nice treat to the group, I would purchase some Girl Scout cookies for dessert. I thought for sure I would be strong enough to bring the contraband into the house and not partake. [sigh]

I won't go into details of how we ended up here, only to say that around 10:30 that night, I found myself in the kitchen with three of my roommates and one honorary roommate. I had purposefully brushed my teeth to avoid consumption of the Samoas I knew were in the kitchen. We started chatting about the day, etc. when someone opened the cookies. They smelled really good, and I figured I could probably just eat one and be fine. Problem is, everyone knew about the cookie fast. I think Kim could sense my shifty eyes, because she moved them farther away. I finally decided I wanted one, and because I didn't want to have to justify my decision before I ate the cookie, I lunged across the counter and in one fell swoop swept up the cookie and popped it into my mouth, all before anyone could say anything. I don't know what I expected, maybe for the conversation to go on without interruption, but the reaction in the kitchen was...well...funny. First there was stunned silence. Then came the laughter and reenactments. Emily likened me to Buddy the Elf with the cotton balls. Reed said he'd never seen such a deft lunge. I did it to be funny (the lunge, not the consumption), but I think it was seen as an act of desperation. After all, I did break the cookie fast in one deft lunge; or, rather, it broke me.

Today I was listening to a segment of RadioLab (I will blog about my love for RadioLab another time) and laughed at its appropriate timing. This week's short podcast was on Mischel's Marshmallows, an experiment in which they were testing the ability of children to delay gratification.

This is the link to the podcast:

http://blogs.wnyc.org/radiolab/2009/03/09/mischel%e2%80%99s-marshmallows/

And below is the video associated with it. If you don't listen to the podcast (it's only 15 minutes) basically this is the video of 4- to 6-year-olds put in a room with three cookies. They are told they can either have one cookie now, or two cookies later...if they wait.



I love this video because of the tactics these kids use to stave off temptation. I especially love the kid who licks the insides of the cookies and then tries to rearrange them so that no one will notice. I know which kid I would probably be. I know what you're probably thinking, that I would either be the kid licking the cookies or the kid not shown leaping across the table to grab all three. Not so. I would be able to resist. I have lots of willpower.

I wrote as much in an email to those who witnessed the kitchen incident.

To my shock, these are the replies I received:

From Reed: "Yeah, in my mind Jules, there's no doubt about it. You'd have definitely failed. But you would have dominated the eat the cookie in one bite test!!"

From Kim: "Dominating that test while killing all others who may be in the path to said cookie..." (Just because there was almost an additional incident involving a "cup"...)

And my favorite, from Emily:



Now, here's the thing. Maybe I should be embarrassed. Along with all of this, recently a friend remarked to me that he had never met anyone who took so much joy in the making and/or consumption of cookies. And I was embarrassed at first (I mean, who wants to be known as the girl who eats cookies, let alone the one who lunges across counters for them?) but then I realized that my love for them really has become more...pronounced as I have spent more time away from my family.

My mom used to make her famous chocolate chip cookies every week. She would time them to come out of the oven for right when we got home from school. We were allowed to have one spoonful of cookie dough and one hot cookie with milk. We would stand around and eat them as we talked about our days. I can still feel the sunshine coming into the kitchen through our awesome 70's wavy-glass window as I tried to pick out the perfect cookie. So, I guess cookies = love. Could I resist them? Yes, of course. But that's like saying I can resist love. Sure, I can do it, but why would I want to? It's much more satisfying to give and receive than to eschew, even if it does require I run a few extra miles to accommodate.

But do all cookies = love? you ask. I say, nay. Some cookies = LUST. Specifically, Granny B's (a.k.a Granny B's Pink Cookies of Death). I can be funny and lunge across a counter for a Samoa because they are yummy and little and sold once a year. You can be funny about love like that. Granny B's Pink Cookies of Death...I don't know. The first time I ever had one was in Nauvoo. We had participated in Mississippi by Moonlight or something to that effect and done some reel dancing and our treat was these individually wrapped sugar cookies. I normally don't like sugar cookies, I told myself, but I'll go ahead and try it. [sigh] I had never tasted anything so wonderfully sinful. I mean, the cookie is not even that good, but something about it spoke to my guilty pleasure meter. Those are not cookies you lunge for. Those are the cookies you sit and stare at, walk by, walk around, and tell yourself in no uncertain terms should you eat one. And yet. And yet...

We have a box of them sitting on our kitchen counter.

I saw them last night and I think a wimper might have escaped. I have had imitation versions of these cookies over the years, but I have never since had a Granny B's. Not since that fateful night in Nauvoo, 8 years ago. It might be more than I can take, I thought. But this morning I saw them again and did not feel tempted. It's not worth the sugar jolt to my system, nor is it worth jeapordizing my run in the morning. I can tell the difference between love and lust...I will prevail.

Take that.