A Sense of Falseness

In 2002, I left the country to meet my half-sister in Scotland. When I left the country, I developed a keen interest in the language. I met with a woman--for a while--that was from Scotland but had settled in my town. She told me something once that always stuck with me. She said that when one parent shelters a child from another, it lends to that child a sense of unreality, like there isn't much connection between what they do and what becomes of it.

Coming home yesterday, I realized that as far as My Sixty Pounds go, I had fallen off the wagon. I had sat that afternoon and ate a large piece of pizza from Whole Foods. There were tons of better choices, and granted, if you're going to eat a piece of pizza, Whole Foods is the joint to visit. But I went on for the rest of the day to eat much more than I needed. This past week with the beginning of school, not only did I not work out (like I had promised myself all the end of the summer--"When I get back in school, I'll get on the eliptical and hit the weights" as I had an injured ankle from the end of the summer) but I ate totally disconnected from what I wanted as a whole. This is a theme in my life--to act in such a manner--time management, promises to my children, eating--where what I do bears no connection to the outcome. I realized I was becoming like my mother, who has spoken for years on end--at least 25--about weight loss and never really managing it. How does she do it--year after year, not make the connection to No being the answer? And how do I manage to avoid it? I remember with horror my father piling up his plate higher than you can imagine, and eating it all. But now, tonight, as I piled on the steamed green beans, I remembered that image of him piling up food was collard greens.

Last week I was talking with my boss, who is by far the most outstandingly inshape person I know--touching him is like feeling steel bands, and I have never seen anyone quite like him, not even amongst the athletes I tutored. He told me that when he stopped working on a project the other night, he ate a bunch of berries way past when he was full. It bothered his conscience. I thought, "Berries? You're worried about berries?" I'm worried about giving in to those yogurt pretzles at the coffee shop between classes.

Next day I exchanged an email with him. "I'm fasting." He wrote back, "Me too!"

This is not a bad idea. If food proves to be a huge temptation and I cannot listen to my body, then why not fast? Why not say, for now, I don't need anything? To connect with what I do and do not need. The disconnect with what I do and what results has permeated everything I know. Perhaps the absence of tool of disconnect will help. And I'm talking short hours, folk. I don't need to eat between every class. I don't need to eat between nine and three, maybe? What do you think? I think it will work, at least for me, to connect with the reality that the anxiety I feel in returning to school, learning the classes the expectations and the schedule and dealing with the horror I feel at getting my own artistic work done will not be alievated or helped by food is a good thing.

On the upside, signed up for a program at school for 4 free training sessions and it was only $20. Did petal the latest trike (last one got stolen. Who in hell steals a trike???) around campus. Forgot that that little bit of transportation is manual labor.