I am not, nor will I probably ever be, a thin man. There is little doubt that Dashiell Hammett did not have me in mind when he wrote his novel entitled "The Thin Man." There are several things that I do have in common with Ernest Hemingway, the main one being that he and I are both to be considered amongst "nature's heavyweights." I live large because I am large, not Orca fat, but hard to miss in a crowd. The wolf that raised me most enduring gift to her only loving cub was the fat gene/shitty metabolism. She was not a small woman, and her bouncing baby boy was destined to follow in her (quite deep) footsteps.
It is a sad commentary on my life that the two biggest joys in it are food and beer. I don't have children, nor do I wish to have them. I do not (clearly) have any sort of sports hobby that would help keep me from looking like an inverted bowling pin (an actual insult that an ex girlfriend used to describe me), Therefore, the little joy I managed to squeeze from life was from the two aforementioned sources. Sad, but hey it's my life, I get to pick the vices. That is until my annual physical, which you could say, if it were graded on a pass/fail basis, I failed in spectacular fashion. I am fat, my blood pressure is through the roof, and my heart may or may not be about to explode. If they had told me I was also stupid it would have been the pinnacle of my health "career." Perhaps the only reason they didn't tell me I was stupid was because they didn't test me for stupidity, a small mercy.
It seems that at my age (45) my body has decided to betray me by breaking down. Granted, there is a school of thought that might say that I am lucky that it has lasted this long. Except for a 2 year stretch where I lost about 45 pounds on weight watchers, I have eaten and drank like a (slightly poorer version of) Roman Emperor. My body has determined that those days are over, or rather has determined that if those days continue, my days will be over. While the thought of dying while shoveling as much bacon as I can get my hands on down my gullet is to be looked upon as "our kind of death." It is not something that I wish to happen anytime soon. As little joy as there is in my life, I have a perverse desire to continue to live it, mainly in the hopes that Nicole Kidman finally comes to her senses, and realizes that her and I are meant to be. Until that blessed day occurs (and it will occur, I just know it) my continued presence on this planet is to be a goal of mine.
Generally things (mostly people, but some things have betrayed me as well) that betray me are in for an unpleasant time of it. I don't make friend easily, and I am a card carrying misanthrope, therefore to betray me does take a lot of effort. Not the actual betrayal, for I have found that to be as easy as falling off a (particularly slick) log. No, the betraying isn't the issue, it is the getting close enough to me in order to effect a betrayal. Luckily, at least for my body, you can't get much closer to me than it. It is my constant companion, and my constant reminder all at the same time. I go to brush my teeth and there it is, bloated, pale, and staring back at me with a let's go get some bacon look in its eyes. That has clearly been something that the rest of me as been on board with way too many times. All of this eat what I want shit has, it seems, go to stop. It is a sad day, the day you have to wave goodbye to bacon for any length of time, but that day has apparently come, and I am not enthused about it.
Like any other betrayer that tip toes into my life, my body is now my enemy. An insidious enemy that must be punished, but that is a tricky proposition. How does one punish their body, without causing too much physical pain? I am not sure if hunger pain is physical or not, but I do certain feel it, and my body should get used to that feeling for a while, because bananas do not stop them. Trust me I have eaten way too many bananas and salads lately. I feel like a cross between an ape and a rabbit. However, my body, my betrayer must be punished, whipped (into shape perhaps) for its sins against the soul (if I have one) and the mind (which is now obsessed with food).
As I mentioned before the dual joys of food and beer provide me almost all the joy in my life. I made the determination that food was going to be the first to go, after all beer gets me drunk, and according to rumors drunk me is a charming bastard (though still a bastard). That charming bastard known as drunk GI, gets sober GI laid, so it behooves me to a least still drink. Sober me is in for a really shitty time of it, but the upside is that with all the food deprivation he is undergoing, it will take a whole lot less beer for drunk me to show up, and (hopefully) that will do two things, save both of us some money, and get us laid quicker. Here's hoping.
