Ace Up My Sleeve January 5, 2009

In high school, I was that girl.  You know, the one who could eat anything and stay stick-thin.  My typical lunch consisted of a massive chocolate brownie and a can of Cherry Coke, dinners were usually French bread pizza, ramen noodles, or a (large) bag of potato chips.  Even so, my weight never fluctuated lower than 118 lbs or higher than 122.  I was 5’6″ and a verified beanpole.

When I went off to college, I bypassed the  “Freshman 15″ and went straight for the Freshman 25.  I’m not sure why, really, since I ate fairly balanced meals, regularly went to tai chi and water aerobics, and didn’t start drinking until I turned 21.  Honest truth.  But still I gained, and it wasn’t exactly a bad thing since even at 122 lbs I was underweight for my height.  By the time I graduated I was hovering around 130-135 lbs, solidly in a size 10 or 12.

Marriage came a year after graduation.  I unintentionally lost some weight for the wedding –the seamstress had to take in all the seams of my wedding gown that she’d just let out– but evened out again shortly thereafter.  Then with the time suck of a full-time adult relationship, a zero-impact desk job, and a serious aversion to cooking, the weight just gradually kept coming.  It’s now over 10 years since my wedding day, and I’ve easily put on 40 lbs or more.  That’s at least 60 lbs heavier than my high school weight.  And I haven’t even had kids.

To be perfectly fair, I carry the weight very well.  There isn’t a person yet who believes me when I tell them how much I weigh, and I probably look 20-30 lbs lighter than I am . . . but I’m not happy about it.  I have a few strikes against me.  The women in my family tend to the wide side of the spectrum.  I truly am, if not big-boned, then dense-boned.  I grew up with incredibly poor eating habits (see lunch and dinner above) and I HATE water as a beverage.  I don’t exercise well outside of a class setting.  I could go on.

Lately, every year I’d see pictures of mysef from bellydance shows, and every year I vowed that next year I’d look better.  Every year was the same as the one before, if not worse.  I look in the mirror and see a pretty girl looking back at me, and yet what I see in photographs is a puffy-faced woman with the beginnings of a double chin and a midsection squishier than half-melted Jell-o.  I don’t like what I see.

I’ve tried a variety of eating plans (I don’t “diet” per se) that have amazing results on everyone but me.  I tried South Beach because a friend boasted of how he dropped 10 pounds within weeks . . . I lost a total of 5 lbs over three months.  I tried the Special K challenge . . . I lost about two pounds over a few weeks, and got a grain bug infestation in my pantry (that was not a metaphor, thank you).

Starting later this week I’ll be trying again, but this time I’ve got an ace up my sleeve.  I’ll be trying Weight Watchers, and aside from the general support they promise as part of the program, I have a friend who has already lost 15 lbs since Halloween who is already my cheerleader and my support, and I have yet to go to a single meeting.  Since I hate to cook, I’m already planning what I need to be able to make bulk meals and freeze them for later (there is an upright freezer in my house’s future).  I tried out a recipe from the official WW cookbook tonight and was pleased with the flavor, if not exactly ecstatic about the portion size.  I’m ready to try to do this thing right this time.

I do not expect to make it to my high school weight.  Truthfully, I think that would be unhealthy for me.  But I am setting an attainable goal of losing 30 lbs, with a stretch goal of losing 50, which would take me roughly to my college weight.  That being said, I’m also going to be smart enough to let my body tell me when enough is enough, and as long as I’m happy with the way I look and feel, I’m not going to quibble over numbers on a scale.

Thursday is my first meeting.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Not Me January 4, 2009

Holidailies is wearing down, and I am wearing down with it.  I’ve truly attempted to update daily, but with the actual holidays interfering I’ve missed a few.  Technically I have only two updates to go, and it’s going to be difficult.

I think this is the reason I update so seldom regularly; I really don’t have much interesting to write about.  I get in ruts (this year’s is apparently death) and can’t seem to introduce new subject matter.  When I do, it’s drivel.  I can’t write humorous posts.  I’m not into current events or technology news or ways to save money or live green.  I’m just me, and just me isn’t a terribly exciting or witty person.

If nothing else, this past month has been a stretch, and it’s taught me quite a bit about who I am, and even more about who and what I am not.  I’m not a writer.

“Bubba” New Year January 2, 2009

I don’t usually make resolutions come January 1. I’m fully aware that I most likely won’t keep up with them anyway, so rather than deal with the guilt of not keeping a promise to myself, I simply ignore the promise-making part and get on with my year. This time I’m trying something different.

I have a few things I’d like to work on, and it just now occurred to me that all my resolutions are based (sometimes loosely) on Jimmy Buffet lyrics:

1. Treat my body more like a temple and less like a tent (Fruitcakes)
2. Be more zen and enjoy life as it comes (Trip Around the Sun, Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On)
3. Follow more of my dreams (Someday I Will)
4. Depend on myself alone for happiness (Tonight I Just Need My Guitar)
5. Go more places that make me happy (One Particular Harbor)

Apparently, I just want to be more like Bubba.

Another Beginning January 1, 2009

The new year has begun, and I hope it’s calmer and less messed up than the last. Just before 2008 ended I got even more bad news, and I can’t help thinking that enough is enough.

If I look on the bright side, at least I got this news last year; I’d rather end a year on an unpleasant note than begin one that way.

Strange, Wonderful December 30, 2008

Friendship is a strange and wonderful thing, and I mean both strange and wonderful in the fullest sense of the words.

Tonight I was driving with my best friend since freshman year of high school when she said something that completely summed up our friendship. It was something along the lines of, “What, decided not to try and kill me tonight?”

You see, we are both very good drivers, and we’ve always been very cautious drivers… except when we’re in a car together. At those times, things just go awry. It isn’t that we’re being reckless or goofing off, we just become Stupid Drivers. We’ve not yet had any actual accidents together –mine have all been solo, she was in a fender-bender with another mutual friend in the car– but there have been plenty of near-misses.

This one was typical. We were on our way from dinner to do a bit of quick shopping, and I needed to make a left-hand turn. It looked like there was plenty of room before the oncoming car would reach us, and I stepped on the accelerator. And as soon as I felt the car start to move, I thought of all the times we’d come so close to a bad outcome, and I braked almost before we started moving.

Not an unwise decision, it turns out, since the oncoming car was moving faster than it appeared. Had I kept going, we probably would have made it through unscathed, but for once I forced the Stupid out of my head and made the responsible driver take charge. I do know that we’ve been lucky so far, and I don’t want our luck to run out while I’m the one behind the wheel.

So yes, tonight I decided not to try to kill you. We’ve got something too strange and wonderful to risk.

I Can’t Believe I Hate a Bookstore December 29, 2008

Bookstores have always been an oasis and a refuge for me. There is little more soul-satisfying than shelves of brand-new books just waiting to be brought home and devoured and gradually worn down by countless loving reads and re-reads. And until tonight, I’ve never been in a bookstore I haven’t liked.

I received two books for Christmas that I’d like to return (one was a duplicate, and the other I have no desire to read even though it was written by the same author) and wanted to know what the store’s policy was. I went to the information desk at the front of the store and asked the slightly stoned-but-happy-looking woman standing there how they handled returns. She replied, “It’s printed on the back of the receipt.”

I calmly explained to her that I had received the books in question as a Christmas gift and didn’t have a receipt. A cashier looked over at me and asked, “Don’t you have a gift receipt?”

I replied to the negative. The cashier then asked, “Did you buy them yourself?” The Information Desk woman looked on in a daze.

I repeated that no, I didn’t buy them, I got them as a gift, and had no receipt of any kind. The cashier then said, “Well then…..”

As I waited for the cashier to continue whatever it was she was saying, Information Desk woman opened up the register tape compartment and pulled out a length of blank tape and handed it to me (the return policy was on the back). The cashier apparently had no intention of finishing her thought and was studiously ignoring me.

I read through the words on the back of the register tape and finally came to a bit about how they’d accept returns without a receipt and give credit in the amount of the lowest sale price of the book over the period of the last 6 months. As I tried to verify this with Information Desk woman, she just gazed at me blankly.

Boggled that not a single employee could tell me the store’s return policy, I folded the tape and put it in my purse.

I normally love bookstores. I left with such hatred for this one that I almost don’t want to return the damn books because I feel sure I’ll get pennies for them in exchange, and I don’t want to give them a cent more than they’re legally due. I almost don’t even want the store credit because I don’t want to encourage the unhelpfulness and vacuity of their staff. I left the store feeling hostile and dirty.

I’m almost dreading going back tomorrow with the books to find out what they’re willing to offer me credit-wise. Depending on their answer, if it isn’t worth the feelings of disgust I get from dealing with that store, I’ll keep the damn books and sell them through Amazon.

Death Be Not Proud December 28, 2008

I had planned on writing something thoughtful and profound about grief tonight. Today I stood in front of yet another casket, mourning the loss of yet another life, and I intended to come back and write about it and pull the experience from my memory and make it accessible. I can’t do it.

There has been too much sorrow and too much grief. There are constantly more and more losses, yet the ranks of the grieving never seem to lessen. I could try to wax eloquent about the lives and legacies of those I miss, but instead I’m tired. I’m tired of the crying, tired of the emptiness, tired of comforting and being comforted. I’m tired of the never-ending reminders of my own mortality, and I want to forget for a time that there is such a thing as death and loss and sorrow. And so you will hear no such reflections from me.

I will, however, offer John Donne’s words:

Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.