Now, I'm not against the occasional indulgence, nor am I one to turn down a sweet treat, but the sheer size of this gargantuan was making my teeth ache. One magnanimous day, it was the same donut - only it was filled with a gooey vanilla custard. O.M.G. I had to speak out.
At lunch that day, I proffered a suggestion that perhaps they could make mine a "healthier" alternative instead. The following week, on my desk sat a muffin that was the equivalent of half a loaf pan! Not only was it blueberry, but the demon bakers had decided to dub this one "Blueberry pancake" which only meant that copious amounts of sugary candy syrup had been applied to the top and dripped down onto the muffin liner, so much so that even licking your fingers after peeling off the wrapper could throw you into a diabetic coma. Of course, I ate it. Well, half.
After a couple weeks of this, I would pick at about a half of the monster muffin, and quietly wrap the rest in a napkin and toss in the garbage. Still, I felt a little guilty about 1) throwing away food that was perfectly good, if not too luxuriant and 2) not having more appreciation for my co-workers' kind gesture. The weeks went by and I found myself unable to eat more than a third before I felt the sugar giving me the jitters.
So, I asked if, in the future, they could bring me a nice sesame bagel instead. I imagined the petite Montreal bagels that I had fallen in love with the summer before - chewy and toasted, loaded with seeds and slathered with half-fat European cream cheese.
The next week, my bagel arrived, but instead of a trim little morsel of golden baked goodness, the bagel was the size of a frying pan and about as heavy as one. I was reminded, gently, that a bagel that size was basically the same as eating four slices of bread. Me, the one who won't even buy bread unless it is fiber-packed, 9-grain, whole wheat, sliced that white-bread giant in half and spread on some cream cheese. Again, I became accustomed to having half, or a third, and jettisoning the rest in hopes that no one would discover my wimpyness in the face of bad food.
How would I tell them that I would prefer a diminutive pastry, lightly sweetened, buttery, preferably French? I probed the matter a little and was informed that the shop only carried ginormous baked goods that could basically feed an entire family.
I'm sure I can hear you saying: ask them to stop bringing you these things, or: don't eat them - throw them away! or: just give up and stick to your yogurt, but the truth is that I appreciated their thoughtfulness very much, and to be even more honest, I loved the indulgence of a sweet treat. I just wished they didn't have to be so danged big! I wondered at which point in time did the size of the average baked good (or soda, or sandwich) in the United States become so whopping big?
These days, they still bring me a donut from a local shop. The small sour cream kind that isn't too sugary but still packs a high-caloric-punch. I stop when I've eaten half. It's the least I could do, in the name of team camaraderie, supporting the local donut shop, in step with the American Way. Still, I dream of a future where a donut is small enough to balance on the saucer of my tea cup, and doesn't lead to gastric bypass. God help us!
