Left Behind

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She had not known the weight until she felt the freedom. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

I am about to embark on an…excavation. Yes, I think that excavation is probably the right word for it, an excavation of my waistline…among other body parts. I am about take up a serious effort to lose some weight. Now not serious to the point of surgery or anything – so maybe regimented effort would be a better way to put it.

I’m a little hesitant to actually put this down in writing, not to mention send it out into the internet void because once I’ve said it out loud (so to speak) I really have to do it. I mean it’s out there. There are witnesses. I’ve changed it from something I can just quietly strive for in unobserved obscurity (which I suppose is what I would prefer) into a publicly announced effort - But what the heck. Maybe if I put it down in writing and send it out into the blog-o-sphere, my goal itself will be less likely to slip away into obscurity.

I’ve been one of those lucky folks that have had “weight issues” for a long time. Most of the extra weight gain came while baby building…then unfortunately stuck around after the baby was born. But as I just married off my first major weight gain, it seems a fitting time (and about time) to get rid of the “baby weight” once and for all.

While I’ve always been pretty good about exercise and going to the gym (falling off of treadmills not withstanding) I have to cop to some deep-seeded childhood issues when it comes to food and to weight. They are the kind of issues that make me feel rebellious about food. You know how it is when the food choices are made for you as a kid or if you’re not given choices you tend (well ,I do anyway) to feel rebellious about people telling me what to eat or when I can eat it. The show-off dieters are another thing I am rebellious (and disdainful ) about. The “I only eat salad” people,” the “ I count every calorie that goes in my mouth” people. The “I look down my nose at anyone that eats dessert” people. Of course these people are usually pretty thin and look great. But again, my derision is deep-seeded and is rooted in the complicated quagmire of my childhood – and how much sense does that ever make? So a lot of these issues, plus just spending a significant amount of time wading through emotional angst over the years have contributed and kept me from ever really committing and getting serious about losing weight.

But recently I was approached someone who is more than an acquaintance but not quite a friend…yet. He’s someone that I’ve known for a long time in a professional capacity but we know stuff about each other because we’ve lived on the fringes of each other’s lives for about a decade and have had some pretty good conversations over the years. Anyway, the last time I saw him was a couple of weeks before Superdude’s wedding. As you may remember, with whole wedding thing I was (am) in an even weirder than usual mental/emotional state and being a good guy he notice my crazily conflicted kind of mood. And you know how it is – sometimes you’re just fine right up until someone asks. Poor guy, his innocent inquiry precipitated a little emotional breakdown for me and we had one of our little talks about changing times and changing circumstances. I guess my apparent mental instability stayed with him because a few days later he called me out of the blue (not our usual friend/acquaintance dynamic) and asked me if I’d be willing to try something - a weight loss plan he’d come across and he offered to act as my mentor/coach for the process. It’s something he wants to get into and could use a guinea pig (so to speak) to get the ball rolling for this business.

Surprisingly enough, even though I’m hugely uncomfortable with the thought of having to have someone else involved in my weight, it wasn’t really a hard decision. Losing weight and concentrating more on my health is something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently - it’s almost like I’ve been kind of expecting some kind of opportunity like this to turn up.

French poet Anatole France
said: All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.

This describes exactly what I’ve been feeling lately. With the kids grown up and moving on it’s the end of one life and the opportunity to enter another. While I’m at it, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to leave some of myself behind as well.