We were out of cookies. Again. Having boys home all summer means empty cupboards, cookie jars and refrigerator shelves. The eco 'burban dad even remarked tonight that it's a little bit like the army around here. Tonight at dinner, I filled plates and glasses and within minutes it was all gone, like our dining room was the mess hall at boot camp. And they were asking for more. Only, that was all that I had prepared. And we were out of cookies. So, I made cookies. Again.In the old days, I wouldn't have fretted about being out of cookies. I would just buy more cookies. Or, dig into the pantry for yet another box of cookies trucked in from Arizona or New Jersey. Today, I make the cookies. I am making so many freakin' cookies these days I feel like a Keebler Elf. Some days, I resent those cookies. Why make cookies when you are so busy? Because now, I can't even bring myself to buy cookies. I don't walk down the cookie aisle, I don't want to buy cookies. I can't buy cookies. I think about all the bad, bad things in cookies. I see all the bad, bad packaging wrapped around the cookies. And how I would be a bad, bad mom for buying the evil cookies. Or, so I think.
In that lies the problem. Sometimes I am too tired to make the cookies, but I make them anyway. Sometimes I am too busy to make the cookies, to stressed to make the cookies, too over extended to make the cookies. But I do it anyway.
I am sure you can imagine - cookies are a metaphor for so many other things in this greener lifestyle. Searching out local food, going out of the way to shop at farmer's markets, looking for products that use less packaging, visiting thrift store after thrift store to find something you need or taking the initiative to write letters, make phone calls or whip up some cookies. Sometimes it's harder, sometimes the search is longer, sometimes the process more complicated, but in the end, we all do it anyway. Why? Because lying in bed at night rethinking the day, I have no second thoughts about local, organic healthy cookies. No guilt for taking the easy way out. No remorse for how I treated our planet.
So, eat the sugar cookies boys. They were made with love, a pinch of stress, a touch of tiredness and a lot of consideration. I will make more tomorrow.
