On Saturday 19 April 2008 at 6:30 in the morning, over my objections and in spite of my doubts, my wife loved me enough to save my life.
Here’s how.
When I got out of high school, I was a really skinny kid. I weight 120 pounds the day I went into the Air Force and I actually think they lied so that they could take me. They put some pounds on me in basic training and tech school. By the time Herself and I were married in 1973 I was up to around 135.
In 1976, I went to Alaska to help keep our country safe by sitting in a cold radar tower and keeping things working. They fed us well. Lots of carbs to keep us warm. I came back to the Lower 48 about 15 pounds heavier. But I was OK with 150 pounds.
We got out of the Air Force in 1978 and moved back to Maryland, to Columbia. In Columbia, part of your community association fee, which they call the Columbia Parks and Recreation Association (CPRA) got you membership into the Columbia Association (CA). CA membership got you into lots of activities: The Supreme Court Tennis and Raquetball Club, all the CA pools including the Swim Center, any of several health club type facilities. I was able to maintain my 150 mostly by swimming and I looked goooood. I felt good too.
tim and dane
Columbia is not a utopia, though some would have you think so. Suffice to say, we were happy to move out in 1989 to Catonsville, a place where neighborhood was not just a convenient subdivision of real estate, it was a place where you had neighbors you actually got to know before they moved away.
Once in Catonsville, I could have joined the YMCA. But I did not. I could have become a walker/jogger. But I did not.
No, I sat down. I stuffed my face. I started to get fat. The fatter I got, the older I felt.
Breakfast would be two slices of bread thick with peanut butter, a glass of OJ and a glass of milk, whole milk, or Burger Kings omelette sandwich with two meats. I’d go out for lunch and have pasta salad, Caesar salad, or fried shrimp, french fries, doubled quarter pounder with cheese, Burger Kings chicken air craft carrier sandwich. When I got home I would fix dinner: steak and mashed potatoes, big heaping plate of spaghetti with 6 or 7 meatballs. Or pick up Wendy’s/Chick-fil-a/ etc. After supper: ice cream, cake, or just watch TV and have some pretzels and Coke. If we went out to dinner, I’d get an appetizer, salad, soup, and entree and eat it all. Then get dessert!
This went on and on. 160, 170, 180, 200! My driver’s license still says 200. I never could bring myself to admit to any more than that.
People tried to tell me. One of my sisters commented that men who let their beards get long tended to get fat too, not that the two had any real connection, it just was so. I had a long beard, a ponytail, and a gut.
christmas (12/22/2007)
I bought a suit. The salesman said I would look best in an “executive cut.” When I asked him to explain, what he described was what once was called “portly” or short and fat. At Christmas 2007, the last before Weight Watchers, I bought another suit, because the last one no longer fit me. The salesman wanted to size it “a little loose so you have a little extra room.” I told him not to do that since I intended to lose some weight. I was disappointed when I discovered he fit the suit a little loose anyway. More disappointed when it fit correctly at Easter 2008.
Bikers (motor- not bi-) would give me a nod. My brother in law told me it was because I “had the look.” Another look I had was of Jerry Garcia. Fat drug addict.
Once my mom asked me why I had a beard. “With it,” I told her, “I’m cute and cuddly. A teddy bear. Santa Claus. Without it, I’m just a short fat white guy.” One of my brother spoke up, “Well, there’s not much you can about short and white.”
I joked that my Guinness tee shirt was not so much a beer ad or a cultural icon as it was a self description: Extra Stout. I joked that I had to eat to maintain my girlish figure: after all, only a woman should be shaped like I was, and only for a short time.
I needed to wake up.
