The Tale Of A Burgeoning Chocoholic

I was a curious child. I also loved sweets.

Around age five, while snooping through my parents closet looking for our Siamese cat, Princess, I discovered a bag of Halloween candy. My parents didn’t keep candy in the house and we were only allowed to consume “added sugar” on holidays and at birthday parties, so the discovery felt like a miracle.

However, my Catholic upbringing had already instilled in me a guilty conscious. Taking a candy would be stealing. Stealing is bad. If I get caught stealing, I will get in trouble. Hmm…

So, I devised a solution. I went back to my bedroom and shook a few coins from my piggy bank. I tucked the coins in my plastic Lion King purse and then traversed across the house on my mission, waving at my mom and little brother as I walked by.

When I arrived back in my parent’s closet, I pet Princess and then set down the purse down, unzipped the top, and began counting my change. I estimated the value of the candy and then conducted my first contactless transaction, leaving a tiny stack of coins beside the now-open bag of chocolate.

I don’t remember whether my parents ever confronted me over the incident, but it’s one of the first stories they told my boyfriend when we began dating. It was a cautionary tale with a dire warning: always have some chocolate around.

But, this wasn’t the first sign of my burgeoning love of chocolate. There is one story that, if you’ve met my mother, you will surely have heard. This month’s theme on The Heart of the Matter is humor. For a good laugh, bunny hop on over to read my latest post, But Mom, The Baby Ruined Easter!