I AM renaming the Fitbit the Fatbit – it sits on my wrist and taunts me when the jammy dodgers sing their siren songs from the biscuit box.
And added to the pain is the fact that it is that time of the year again... the ‘C’ word.
We have hardly dried our sodden hair from the Halloween bobbing for apples and repaired the cracked tooth from the pound coin in the apple tart, when the Christmas lights are dangling in the shopping centre and some fool somewhere is putting up a fir tree.
I’m a fool too. I took my nephew to the centre at the weekend and he fell in love with a big soft cuddly red blanket covered in Santa Clauses and snowmen. Well, who could say no?
He wore it around his neck like a Sumo wrestler wears his towel and refused to let it go.
“Can I put it on my bed?” he asked, at least 10 times.
“It’s lovely,” said his poor mother, “But you do realise that it’s the beginning of November and he’ll be thinking Santa is coming every night between now and then.”
I didn’t think about that. By this stage, she’ll be tortured with questions about the imminent arrival of the man in scarlet. I can only say sorry, sorry, sorry.
But to get back to the Fatbit – it is the winter that does it. Like bears and squirrels and other hibernating animals, the god of the universe is telling me to fatten up.
There is irony there – I’m fattened up plenty already – but all of a sudden, I’m avoiding the gym and nestling up in bed with at least three recipe books at a time and dreaming of clouds of fluffy meringue and big stodgy slices of Battenberg.
The other day, I made a sunshine curry. It was delicious. It was probably the calorific coconut milk.
“Smells, wonderful. I’ll have some of that tomorrow,” said my husband.
At 3am that night, it repeated a little and woke me up with what, at first, appeared to be acute appendicitis but turned out to be a not-so-cute case of chick peas.
Never did a man switch sides so swiftly, “No thanks,” he said, retreating at lightning speed from the curry pot.
Personally, it was worth it. He doesn’t know what he missed.
And when I’m leafing through recipes, my heart turns to the old recipe books at home. My mother wrote the secrets of her wonderful baking into a little hard-backed book. She gave us free rein in the kitchen and we baked and cooked to our hearts’ content.
After peeling spuds for eight and hacking at raw turnip, the chance to make an Eve’s Pudding or a Pavlova was hard won and appreciated.
Over the years, the book was splodged with raw cake mix and stained with the syrup from the stem ginger jar. Well-used is well-loved.
She copied out her recipes in neat swirled writing – the kind they taught in the days long before the computer rendered handwriting redundant.
And all the recipes were attributed. So that when I’m dreaming of something sweet and tasty, I might ponder Peggy’s rum truffles – a Christmas treat rolled up in chocolate sprinkles – or Mrs Craig’s flakemeal shortbread – fresh from the oven and melt-in-the-mouth delicious.
Those were different times – my mother may have had six small ones but she had a heart and a half for everyone. She was a good neighbour – a generous maker of buns and apple tarts, a giver of time and herself.
She was always there for Mrs Craig whose husband died shortly after they moved in next door. She ran messages, she tidied, she cooked when she could.
In return for my mother’s love, freely given, love was returned across the garden hedge. It came in a pot of rich barley and ham-bone soup or a jar of home-made raspberry jam.
It came when they exchanged bridal gladioli from their gardens or midnight blue irises – just like in Van Gogh’s painting.
So that when my mother called to see her one morning and found her dead in her hallway, a little bit of my mother died too and she mourned again for her own mother who died young.
But the love lives on in Mrs Craig’s recipes – the wartime lessons of make-do and bend – 100 uses for a ham bone or a good rabbit stew, copied out in neat copper-plate.
And winter mornings find me at the cooker, baking bread and stirring soup, wondering if I’m too late to try for a Christmas cake and making a mental note to ask my mum about her perfect recipe for stuffing.
