Sweet Escape?

by Hohna Cass

"Mmmm."

I closed my eyes and savored the milk chocolate melting in my mouth. It had been a stressful nine-and-a-half hours of work, and on the snowy drive home I remembered the chocolate I'd stored in the top cupboard for just such a day. Now, seated at my kitchen table, I held a half-eaten piece at arm's length and admired the dark hunk for a moment. "Oh chocolate, blessed soothing comforts of chocolate!" Slowly, I brought it back to my mouth and allowed the last of my chocolate stash to take the journey beyond my lips. "I'll miss you!"

"Who will you miss?"

I broke from my reverie to see my roommate standing just inside the door. Apparently I had missed her entrance.

Rather sheepishly, I admitted, "My chocolate."

"Chocolate? You have chocolate?"

"Had chocolate. It is no more." I waved the empty wrapper, proving the surrender of its contents. The italicized letters on the paper spelled out Sweet Escapes. Truer words, I thought, were never printed.

Have you ever wanted to escape the reality of life? Have you ever had the kind of day where everything went wrong from the time your feet hit the floor, and by day's end you just felt the urge to get away from it all? I have a girlfriend who actually bought herself an SUV on the way home from a bad day at work. It sounds extreme, but try to remember if you've ever been tempted to do a little therapeutic shopping during a particularly stressful time in your life.

I personally like to shop for shoes at such a time. Shoes, as opposed to other clothing items, always fit, and the only thing I have to do is take mine off and try on a new pair. If I'm already stressed out, then standing in a miniature room, surrounded on all sides with mirrors, and repeatedly undressing and dressing is not my idea of relief.

As for chocolate, I can't tell you how many times I've been listening to the woes of a girlfriend when she paused midsentence and announced: "I think I need some chocolate." Recognizing this as the plea for help that it is, I head for the kitchen to see what I can find.

Few females of my acquaintance would dispute the restorative powers of chocolate. Whoever came up with the name Sweet Escapes for a chocolate bar was no fool. I'm convinced, however, that it must have been a man who came up with Big Chunk. I don't intend to offend, but really, if you understood the power and importance of chocolate, you would recognize the delicate task of naming it.

Speaking of chocolate, my friend and I recently saw the film by that name. I was amused but not surprised to find that the matinee audience consisted entirely of women, seated in twos and threes, scattered about the theater. I find it no small coincidence that a movie about chocolate, featuring Johnny Depp as the love interest, drew an all-female audience at 10:45 on a Saturday morning. Perhaps this says more about our taste in films than our desire to get away from it all, but movies, particularly those featuring chocolate and dark hunks of the male persuasion, are another way we women escape from the day-to-day.

Among females, there seems to be a general consensus about the escapist powers of chocolate, shopping and romantic movies. Cathy Guisewhite, author of the syndicated cartoon Cathy, regularly sends her main character to the video store in search of a vicarious romantic experience, to the mall in a fit of neuroses or to the grocery store to stock up on therapy snacks. If her cartoon strip was not evidence enough of her deep understanding of the female psyche, the title of one of her comic collections "Shoes: Chocolate for the Feet" closes the case.

The success of a cartoon strip like Cathy, and the ease with which we women relate to her subject matter, bears some consideration. In particular, it makes me wonder about the regularity with which we escape. I'm not suggesting that the occasional craving for chocolate is an indicator of deep psychological problems, or that watching a movie on the weekend means we have a chronic inability to face reality. I am suggesting that the real reasons we continue to escape may remain masked because of our habitual getaways, and that the activities we continually lean on for relief may be lacking.

I have been doing some personal experiments on this subject, the results of which may interest you. When I am feeling stressed and unnaturally propelled to the mall or a movie, I stop myself and say, "Self, what are you hoping to accomplish by charging your credit card into oblivion? When you get home, will you really have anything more than when you left?"

Or "Even if you relate to the characters in the movie, laughing and crying with them, won't your reality be the same when you exit the theater and head for the parking lot?"

My response to these questions has been pathetically unsatisfactory. Instead of answers that would soothe my conscience and justify my actions, I find myself confronted with the personality conflict I'm having at work or the concerns I've been harboring about my family across the country. It dawns on me that these are exactly the thoughts I've been trying to avoid. It dawns on me that my bad day has little to do with the fact that I'm sitting in the mall parking lot talking to myself.

I realize that my sudden itch to pull out the plastic has everything to do with larger, ongoing stresses that I may not have acknowledged to myself up to that point. As a Christian woman, I also realize that my desire to run impulsively toward shopping, chocolate and the movies is a sign that I'm seeking fulfillment outside its true source: relationship with Jesus Christ. I'm personally convinced that God will be waiting for me in heaven with the ultimate chocolate (white, of course, with all the flavor of dark). Until then, it's a comfort to know that He has not left me without recourse, and that I can choose to run toward Him through Christ, rather than running up a bill with an interest rate of 22 percent.

Keeping all this in mind, I feel it's only fair to acknowledge that I'm not a psychologist, I don't play one on TV, and I don't pretend to be one in this article. I realize it's quite possible that unlike me, you aren't dealing with latent stresses when you compulsively head for a box of chocolate or the movies. I understand that perhaps you never mistake your credit card for the pathway to peace and that you just have a penchant for shopping.

Nonetheless, just girl-to-girl, I'd encourage you to conduct some personal experiments of your own. Trying to understand my own motivation for escaping reality and the truth about what I' m seeking has been an eye-opening experience for me. It might be for you too.

As for me, I still love chocolate and shopping, and I'm not giving up the movies, but these days I'm learning a thing or two about myself and my stress attacks. I'm recognizing that dealing with stress as it comes helps me to see my life differently. Rather than waiting for the next excuse to escape, I'm looking for ways to enjoy the here and now, while acknowledging that disappointment and pain are part of the package. I'm trying to remember that Christ is holding out His arms to me even as I run in the opposite direction. I think it has something to do with perspective and possibly prayer, but I can't quite put my finger on it...

You know, I'm sure I heard somewhere that the ingredients in chocolate improve the clarity of the thought processes.

It occurs to me that I may have some in my cupboard for just such an occasion.