I am on a diet.

But wait, you may say (as so many have). You don’t need to be on a diet! Look how skinny you are! Everyone says this in a tone of voice that implies the sort of eating disorders associated with teenaged girls. I catch them looking at me speculatively, as if the next time they see me will be on the cover of a pamphlet.

The truth is, I gained almost twenty pounds and doubled my body fat over the past three years. I attribute this to Rob’s delicious cooking, but Rob’s delicious cooking is a double-edged sword, nourishing but addictive. Go ask Alice about his homemade ice cream.

I have enough body image problems without people putting their two cents in, and it irritates me that they feel compelled toward this sort of commentary. Of course, I am not helping matters when I trumpet my dietary restrictions like a street-corner preacher. In my diet, I have cut out all sugars and sweeteners, dairy products, starches, fats (except for flax seed oil), caffeine, and alcohol. I can eat lean meat, vegetables, eggs, and fruit. Although I often feel as if I’m living on the Wild Frontier (if the Wild Frontier had a Whole Foods in it), I must be doing something right: I’ve lost over six pounds so far and am aiming to make it a perfect ten.

If this doesn’t happen by Tuesday, there will be much consternation indeed.

* Mrs. Garrett was the school dietician at the Eastland School for Girls in Peekskill, New York before she opened her own gourmet food shop called Edna's Edibles, which tragically burned to the ground. It was later (equally tragically) rebuilt into Over Our Heads, a more highbrow version of Spencer's Gifts run by four young women with too much mousse in their hair and a young George Clooney.