“You’re not you when you’re hungry,” that’s the way the Snickers commercial goes. I was thinking about how true that was while sitting at my desk the week after New Year’s, trying to make a dent in the towering stack of patient records.
Normally I was pretty focused in my job as a nurse. I could handle something like half my patients at the nursing home coming down with the flu overnight. But today, hunger distracted me. I could use a candy bar.
All day I’d rushed from one appointment to the next. I hadn’t had a chance to eat anything and it was freezing outside–20 degrees below zero. Too cold to drive to the nearest store. My stomach growled. Most days, I was a health nut. I even ran a flaxseed business, Golden Valley Flax, with my husband, Mark, on the side. But when the weather got like this, I got a craving for sweets.
I sifted through my desk drawers. I ransacked the office kitchen. Not much there. Even the vending machine had nothing that looked satisfying. Please, God, even a snack-size Snickers will do!
By the time I got home at 7 p.m., I was even crankier. Mark hadn’t started supper. I felt myself transforming into someone whiny and shrill, like that Fran Drescher character from that TV show, The Nanny. Mark kept his distance.
“There’s a box for you on the kitchen table,” he said. “Maybe that will… cheer you up.”
I tore the box open. Inside were two, shiny red and gold tins of cookies, a gift from Mildred, a regular Golden Valley Flax customer. It wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but I was too hungry to be picky. Then I removed the rest of the tissue paper from the box. There was something else, tucked underneath.
Eleven king-size candy bars. Even before I unwrapped one and took a bite, I was feeling more myself again.
“The box looked a little empty,” Mildred explained when I called to thank her. “And I had all these leftover stocking stuffers. Hopefully, you’re a fan of Snickers?”
