Giving thanks for restraint

I was going to make some pumpkin bread to bring to Thanksgiving dinner. I copied the recipe down by hand from my mother’s Betty Crocker cookbook which is baptized in shortening splatters. I was looking forward to ridding myself of the four pounds of pumpkin puree in my freezer. Last week I even checked to make sure I had enough flour in the cupboard.

Then last night I looked at my dirty dishes in the sink and I didn’t want to wash them. And I thought about driving to the grocery on Thanksgiving Eve to buy shortening and shuddered. But mostly I knew that if I baked a loaf of pumpkin bread, I would eat half a loaf of pumpkin bread before Thursday morning. I would tell myself not to. I’d believe that I could restrain myself. But who am I kidding? If I bake a loaf of pumpkin bread I’m going to eat half of it in a day. That’s just who I am.

So I put away the recipe and stuffed the thawed pumpkin back [...]

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