Mine Mine Mine!

A whoopie pie is irresistible is it not? But then after it's consumed, the sugar makes you high and icky feeling, and all that shortening seemingly sits in your gut for the next 6 days at least. Bleck. I've vowed (for the last 10 years or so) not to let a single one tempt me again into buying it. But they just look so big and buxom that I fall for it every time. There is only one whoopie pie in existence that actually tastes as good as it looks (and it looks pretty damn good, ay?) and doesn't make me feel violently ill afterward, mentally or physically. They come from a little store in Island Pond, VT. Hubby and the girls bestowed me...just me...with one for an early Mother's Day treat today. These gems are filled with whipped cream...probably the industrial stuff from a bag...but it's light and fluffy, not overly sweet, and my hips don't seem to mind it as much as they do the Crisco. I ate half of this one after I got home from being treated to breakfast by my mother-in-law this morning. I had had a fruit-granola-yogurt bowl, so the extra bazillion calories of whoopie afterward was totally legit, according to my calculations.

Speaking of my mother-in-law, she's a gem also. She and my father-in-law are really great and seemingly love me as their own, and I them. Keep in mind that my husband is an only child, so I really beat the odds here. Not to say we haven't had our rough patches, but somewhere along the line over the last 18 years I grew duck feathers that have served me well.

They say men are attracted to women that are similar to their mothers and that women are attracted to men that are similar to their fathers. It's nothing incestuous; it's just nature, and I buy it for the most part...but my husband may be the exception to the rule. His mother is short; I'm tall. She's very dependent; I'm painfully independent (other than mechanical work on cars or appliances, I can pretty much get it done on my own without it turning into too much of a horror show). She's very particular...the woman actually has a methodical way of folding and storing her used grocery bags; my used bags are crumpled and crammed into my "bag bag," bulging and falling out of its ends that no longer have viable elastic. She sometimes has her car professionally cleaned; I like to keep at least one layer of debris on the floor of mine at all times - a poor-man's carpeting, if you will. She lays her husband's clothes out on the bed for him every morning (that's every morning for the past 40 years), and she adores ironing; my husband has to walk bare naked down to the laundry room in the cold basement every morning to dig through the 6-foot-tall pile of unfolded laundry to find, hopefully, two socks that match, and a wrinkled T-shirt. I sometimes wonder if she has to pop a couple Prozac before entering my house, and maybe spray herself down with Lysol upon exiting. But God love her, she never lets what must be her true disgust show - she never says anything (my father-in-law does that for her, but that's why I'm a duck). I can only hope to be so organized someday...until then, I'm just grateful their hearts are made of gold.

Back to the only-child thing...I think only-children get an unfair rap, to be quite honest. The stereotype is that they are spoiled, sniveling, selfish children who grow up to be only slightly less spoiled, sniveling, selfish adults. Maybe that's the case in some instances, but I really got thinking about it today, and it occurred to me that *I*, the middle child of three, do not like to share one bit. And this is my theory why that is: Survival of the fittest (or at least the one with the quickest tongue...oh yeah, admit it...you too lapped and/or spit on that last hot dog to claim it as your own - didn't you!?). I grew up with two brothers. What's mine was mine, what's theirs was theirs, and if there was any fuzzy middle ground, you can bet there was bickering, biting, punching, pulling of hair, gnashing of teeth...you get the picture. I didn't like to share even with my friends, and the thought of letting a friend BORROW one of my possessions was enough to strike fear and dread into my very soul. I still don't like to share food. I'm like a lone wolf gnawing the marrow out of the last elk femur, growling at any other beast that dare approach. In the high school cafeteria I had a friend or two that would ask for a bite of whatever I was eating, on a daily basis. "No! Geez...here's a dollar - get your OWN slice of pizza." "But I just want a bite..." Urrrrrgh! To this day, don't come near my plate for I will stab your hand with my fork, for real. I HAVE mellowed considerably as I've aged, and having children has helped too, I'm sure. It still takes every cell in my being to split a dessert with a friend at a restaurant, but the fact that they are getting half the fat and calories helps me sustain the ruse of charitability.

My husband and his parents spent their years living together sharing what they had in a peaceful manner. It was the three of them against the world, not against each other. Does my husband have SOME stereotypical only-child attributes at times? Sure, but he's a loving, extremely confident, generally easygoing guy; and I've found the pros outweigh the cons. We are the focus of his parents' lives. We got the supersized TV as a wedding gift. We got the supersized fridge as our housewarming gift. On a somber WAY-down-the-road-I-hope note, there will be no sibling disputes over their estate. And most importantly, our daughters get every ounce of their love and attention.

So, this afternoon after buying my mother-in-law her annual Mother's Day gift of a big, beautiful basket of flowers to hang on her porch all summer, I came home to that other half of the whoopie pie. I took pictures of it, I lapped it with longing and affection, and I nibbled the chocolatey morsels. The family started to gather...the girls (and even the diabetic husband) teased with their outstretched tongues...I told them it was MINE, that they had bought it for ME...that they should've gotten their Own.

There was pouting...there were even tears...and then the bristly hair on the wolf's back relaxed, and it stretched out its paws and gave them the last two bites.