Candy Confessions

With late-October comes the bountiful Hershey Harvest, the gleaning of the gummy bears, the celebration of the sugar. With the influx of candy into the house, I find myself very tempted by the goodies. Too tempted. My top three candy-eating excuses are:

1. My job, as mother of the house, is to check all children’s treat bags for razor blades, poisons, and other signs of tampering. In the course of my duties, it is occasionally apparent that a candy needs to be tasted, chewed thoroughly, and swallowed to insure the safety of said-candy.

2. Many candies are not age-appropriate. Joel does not possess the chewing capabilities Starburst or Tootsie Rolls demand. It is my job to chew these candies when he cannot. He cannot eat jawbreakers, lollipops, caramel, or Sweet Tarts. It all falls on my shoulders, unfortunately.

3. Often, children do not appreciate the more exotic tastes many candies possess. Coconut? Forget it! Almonds? Yucky! The finer European chocolates? Too complex for juvenile taste buds. My heart hates to see the yucky candies go to waste, so I save them from being bitten in half and spit out in disgust. I intervene before hand, saying “You don’t like Almond Joy, remember? Remember last year? You said you were going to die of grossness if you ate it. It has NUTS. And coconut, that white stringy gross stuff that you say is gross.”

Gosh, it is going to be one busy weekend around here, with all the poison-preventing, choking-hazard-candy-alerts, and saving innocent candies from the doom of being half-eaten and in the garbage. I hope I can keep up with it.