To my disbelief and my family's shock (or so I believed, considering that I'd somehow managed to polish off the last of my Christmas-themed pile of chocolate coins and precious bags of Revels before Shrove Tuesday rolled around the corner), I mustered enough energy - by probably draining the electricity sockets of sparky power, therefore landing myself with a larger-than-ever bill - to live without a single square of milky, cocoa-flavoured goodness until Easter Sunday arrived, signaling the end of a month and a half's struggle against my mouth-tingling demons.
And as today is Ash Wednesday - otherwise known as the first of forty days and nights where you fully know that a hefty battle is preparing to begin against your addictive fetish for food, shopping sprees or whatever you choose to give up - I wish to dedicate this entry to the fascinating, yet slightly glum (for a sugar rush is strictly forbidden under my self-produced rules) subject of Lent. A moody, hormonal teenager like myself just enjoys bringing up the most depressing topics, right?
Anyway, I was humming and harring over whether to participate in my chocolate-free spell of madness for a second year running last week as it suddenly occurred to me that the one day of the year when I can proudly declare my life-long penchant for thick (without any references towards a person's level of intelligence), fluffier-than-Bart-the-kitten's-fur penchant and lemon-drizzled pancakes means that Lent is sure to follow the day afterwards, so the pressure to make an all-final decision placed an agonizing weight above my shoulders. Compared to the current hassles of moving away in three or so weeks' time, choosing whether I'm in enough of a genial mood (which, as my brother has recently formed the irritating habit of discussing the ins and outs of Minecraft like there is no tomorrow, is becoming more and more difficult to settle into like a new pair of tightly squeezed shoes) to follow the crowd willingly and wave farewell to a beloved treat for several weeks ought to be a piece of cake, shouldn't it?
Perhaps I ought to give up bringing up the mouth-watering topic of cake, homemade chocolate chip biscuits and anything found in the confectionary section at the wider-than-a-WeightWatchers-attendee's-waist Asda in town until Lent is over because I'm sure that there are plenty of you who are a million times braver than myself when it boils down to chucking half of your cupboards' contents in preparation of six weeks of semi-fasting and a strict ban on Chinese takeaways. Talking of which, the cupboards in the kitchen are in desperate need of being cleared out before my family and I move away because it is the very least of our intentions to bring a warehouse-load of Heinz baked beans and half-eaten packets of marshmallows in the limited space we have in the car. Therefore, steering clear of temptation like a perilously cheap bottle of hair dye available in the 99p shop isn't even a proper dilemma at the moment because avoiding an on-going battle against waste and an opportunity to have a last bite of Christmas shortbreads is higher up my list of priorities. And who, if the choice is laid out before them, would complain?
But like so many other things to which I cannot even put a name, forging something strangely new or tediously difficult gives free way to your weaker side to unleash itself upon your vulnerable self, especially as the matter is all but preying on your mind on a regular basis at the oh-so-hard beginning. I distinctly recall a pang of sadness hitting me like a wrecking ball (who ever thought that I would willingly make a reference to Miley Cyrus?) when an evening passed without a single bar of chocolate being ripped open eagerly by my cocoa-splattered fingers but, within the space of a few days, the initial rocky waves of disappointment passed as I placed my attention upon other matters - the rollercoaster-like after-effects of going cold turkey cannot drag your mood to an all-time low forever, can it?
So, I successfully steered myself clear of other treats such as shop-bought biscuits, sugar-laden ice cream and a specially-priced bag of liquorice allsorts until the forty days of my chocolate-free existence came to an end. By now, it would have probably been expected for myself to be dancing with a childlike delight at the prospect of eating a quarter or so of my chocolate egg within a matter of days, but the once-strong hunger which I specially reserved for chocolate had all but diminished: sadly, my sixteen year old cat, Tom, had passed away two days before Easter, leaving my appetite in a state of shock and disrepair.
Although I did eventually gave into having a little bit of chocolate on Easter Sunday - regardless of however I feel, continuing traditions like those is an absolute must - the chocolate had lost somewhat of its sweetness and didn't taste as wonderful as I expected, instantly making me wish that I hadn't touched any of it so quickly after Lent came to an end. And then the truth suddenly left a massive impact on me: whatever chocolate I'd ever tasted within my lifetime, the variety which I had usually been consuming just didn't taste as great as I once believed. All along, I'd been craving the small percentage of cocoa which barely existed in my chosen Easter egg, so from that moment on I made quite a large lifestyle change which I continue to advocate to this day: milk chocolate, famously riddled with a high amount of teeth-rotting sugar, is not my friend. Dark chocolate has proudly become a vice which I don't feel too guilty about consuming once or twice a week because, unlike the majority of chocolate brands being stocked around the world, the health-benefiting cocoa finally has a chance to take centre stage.
Therefore, making a decision regarding the items which I plan to give for Lent this year has been fairly difficult, to say the least. A couple of days ago, I came across an article which praised the goodness found in cocoa, declaring that a small amount - as I preferably have - is enough to benefit one's heart. Traditionally, the food-related items which people give up for Lent are typically unhealthy - think of oil-cooked crisps, sugary cakes and the ten or so biscuits which you usually reserve for special occasions - and so I intend to carry on with this theme. Yet unlike last year, during a period where my obsession with milk chocolate had hit an all-time high, cutting out a few treats is definitely going to be easier than ever; I've chosen liquorice allsorts/marshmallows (when my hawk-like eyes are not looking in his direction, my brother will probably finish the bag) and milk chocolate (as a tribute to last year), so I think that I'll do pretty well without any of those items until Easter Sunday.
I hope that any of you who have made the decision to participate in Lent will succeed with their ambition and benefit from the joys of gaining self-control - good luck!
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