I was going to include a picture, but I ate the thing too fast.

Dear universe,

I thought we were friends. I thought we'd been straight with each other. My entire life, we've had an understanding: I don't predict the future, and you don't get between me and my chocolate. It was a good system. It worked. I was happy, you were happy, we both got what we wanted.

Which brings me to my main point. You've been holding out on me, universe. For the last 32 or so years, you've kept the Pizookie a secret. And even when I went out to eat a few times with my husband or a girlfriend at BJ's Brewhouse and Restaurant, and heard the word for the first time, I thought, "Ooooh, weird word. I don't want to eat it if I can't figure out from hearing it what it is." But that was your chance, universe. That was your golden opportunity to step in and set the record straight on what the Pizookie was, and what it could do for me.

But you didn't. It was only within the last couple months or so that I happened to catch sight of a magical dish at BJ's -- as a server marched past me, I caught a whiff of what could only be described as the smell of a freshly-baked cookie. And I wondered. A cookie? At a brewery and upscale eatery? How rustic. How unpretentious. How not what I expected. I couldn't possibly be smelling a warm chocolate chip cookie. No way.

But further investigation of the menu and a long discussion with the waitstaff disabused me of my erroneous assumptions. Not only was BJ's offering me a freshly-baked cookie, universe, it was offering me one served warm in a small deep-dish pizza pan, in a variety of flavors, topped with cold ice cream. And as I tried to decide which flavor to order, the waiter told me -- wonder of wonders -- "If you can't decide, ma'am, you can always choose a Pizookie that's a half-and-half, so you can sample two flavors in the same dessert."

What an embarrassment of riches, universe! What a complete genius decision on the part of the kitchen!! My waiter was sent forth with an order to bring me, immediately, a Pizookie that was half chocolate chunk cookie, half white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. Warm. From. The. Oven. 

And so he did. And as my spoon sunk through bite after bite of chewy cookie and cold, melty ice cream, my heart overflowed with both joy and sadness. For this magnificent dessert was all I could ask a dessert to be, and yet it would have to eventually end. And also, universe, I had waited 32 long years before tasting it at all. All those birthdays spent not eating Pizookies! All those formal dances in high school not ending up at the Brewhouse for "dessert only, please"! All those boyfriend break-ups in college drowned in run-of-the-mill grocery store ice cream! The tragedy of it still wrenches my heart.

That's why, universe, it will be some time before I can trust you again. For if you've kept the Pizookie from me for so long, what else have you been keeping to yourself? Mashed potatoes with butter that make you lose weight? A new form of hardcover books that, once read, give you the equivalent calorie-burn of a five-mile run? If you're keeping these things from me, universe, you can consider our friendship over.

Think long and hard about it before you betray me again.