It matters

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It matters

Kid, you'll move mountains!

Congratulations!

Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!


You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

And when things start to happen, don’t worry. Don’t stew. Just go right along. You’ll start happening too.

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!

You’ll be on your way up!
You’ll be seeing great sights!
You’ll join the high fliers who soar to high heights.


Except when you don’t.

Because, sometimes, you won’t.

I’m sorry to say so but, sadly, it’s true that Bang-ups and Hang-ups can happen to you.

You can get all hung up in a prickle-ly perch. And your gang will fly on. You’ll be left in a Lurch.
You’ll come down from the Lurch with an unpleasant bump. And the chances are, then, that you’ll be in a Slump.

And when you’re in a Slump, you’re not in for much fun. Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.

You will come to a place where the streets are not marked. Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked. A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin! Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in? How much can you lose? How much can you win?

You can get so confused that you’ll start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.


The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.


No! That’s not for you!

Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying. You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing. With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky. Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!


Oh, the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done! There are points to be scored. There are games to be won. And the magical things you can do with that ball will make you the winning-est winner of all. Fame! You’ll be famous as famous can be, with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.


Except when they don’t. Because, sometimes, they won’t.

But on you will go though the weather be foul. On you will go though your enemies prowl. On you will go though the Hakken-Kraks howl. Onward up many a frightening creek, though your arms may get sore and your sneakers may leak. On and on you will hike. And I know you’ll hike far and face up to your problems whatever they are.

And will you succeed?

Yes! You will, indeed!

(98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.)

Kid, you’ll move mountains!

So…be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray or Maxabella, you’re off to Great Places!

Today is your day!

Your mountain is waiting.

So…get on your way!

A chocolate bar for a job well done...

I had a healthy lunch so now I feel like 'rewarding' myself with an unhealthy afternoon snack. Hmmmmm.... there's something there...

That pesky inner voice

It occurred to me today that I am very, very good at ignoring my sensible inner voice. It's like my mind starts a sentence and then interrupts itself. I think it's partly due to my eternal optimism; I don't want to hear the negative. I think I ignore the voice because I don't like what it has to say.

It's costing me. How can I tune in and listen again?

One word: chocolate

Exploring why I'm here part 1

I can never reveal my weight. I'm so embarassed by it I can't even acknowledge it to myself.

I remember when I was a young dieter who wanted to lose 5 kilos or so (and probably didn't even need to) I was so dismissive of the really-fat people who 'let themselves go'. How could they let themselves get like that? How could they not care?

I imagined that the really-fat people were lonely, sad, unintelligent. I imagined they had nothing to really care about, so they used food to make themselves feel better.

Now I'm really-fat and I also know that I was really-stupid back then.

I'm not sad or lonely or unintelligent. Quite the opposite in fact. I'm happily married to the love of my life (LOML) and I have three utterly gorgeous children (The Tsunamis) who I love to bits and pieces.

I have a career I love and I even manage to fit in the working thing with the mummying thing without too many hassles.

I can genuinely say that I'm content and happy with my charmed and wonderful life. Which may or may not be part of the reason that I just can't get motivated to lose weight. I haven't been frightened by a health scare. Or laughed at in public. Or humiliated by broken chairs or silly people. I'm heavy, but probably not that heavy.  I don't know, how fat do you have to be to break a chair? I do know that when I was having a spa treatment the other day at the back of my mind I kept thinking "I hope the table can hold me." So that can't be good.

One way or another, I've been trying for 20 years to get down to my 'ideal' weight. Most years I've done nothing but thought about it constantly. Some years I've been successful. I've lost the same 10 kilos over and over. A whole person has been whittled away.

I've never felt the urge to embrace the fat. I respect that people all come in different shapes and sizes. I respect that some people just want to get off the food merry-go-round and accept themselves as they are. But I've never been able to do that. Fat me doesn't feel 'like me'. I don't know how I know that as it's been so long since skinny me was even in the ball park. But I just know.

And here I am. Heavier than I've ever been. Searching for the courage to stop my self-denial and really face up to the fact that I'm fat and should by all counts be miserable about it.