the cookie incident

The woman likes sweets. When she started, there were still lots of little chocolates and candies around the house, left over from the holidays. I put them in cut glass bowls on the kitchen counter -- dangerous, pretty, and irresistible that way. When I noticed them disappearing, and not, as usual, into my mouth, I was pleased. The more she ate, the less the temptation for me. Then, after she’d leave for the night, I started finding chocolate wrappers all over the place -- in the buka’s stroller, on the bed, on the floor, in the bathroom trashcan. How many was she eating?

I’ve written before about how great Greeks are about giving gifts. They never come over empty-handed. So when a friend came to visit one afternoon, she brought me a big box of cookies from a bakery, all wrapped up with a gold ribbon. There were chocolate cookies, butter cookies, and cinnamon cookies, about ten of each. We each tried one, with our tea. A little later, as I was leaving the house, I offered the woman “a cookie.” When I returned, there were chocolate cookies. Only chocolate cookies.

The next day, I had an appointment and came back late, after the woman had left. I looked all around the kitchen, and finally found the box, but not the cookies. She’d eaten them all.

I don’t really care about the cookies. But the whole story, which has left me slightly obsessed with cookies, makes me wonder. Could the woman be hungry? She was given permission to help herself to whatever she wants while she’s here, so I can’t really fault her. Still, eating all the cookies in somebody else’s home -- that’s just not cool.