Hermetically Sealed

I wouldn’t normally write about this but I suspect that nobody but the random stranger reads this blog at this time so here goes:

I’ve lost 23 pounds over the last month.

I woke up one morning and reached for my obligatory 2 Tylenol and had one of those movie-like pauses where I could see the tips of my fingers suspended in that tiny space where nothing exists just before the smooth surface of the bottle would have began. I paused for some reason that is still unknown to me, but it was long enough to see the word “WHY?” in big white bubble-letters in my mind’s eye.

Why what?

Why was I taking Tylenol? Why were they obligatory? Whey had I been taking 2 every morning, afternoon, and evening for the last month? Why did I feel a slow panic welling up when the bottle started running low? Why?

The rest of that day, I rolled over the “whys” in my head a dozen different ways. By the end of the day I had the answer: Because my knees hurt and had been hurting more and more and more.

Another set of deconstructing the “why” part of my knees hurting lead me to examine my eating habits, my exercise habits, and finally my propensity over the last few years to grind my life into the ground like a cigarette butt with a fury of tasks to accomplish and an occasional hurricane of things to fix.

Something in me clicked 30 days ago. Something that said, “Your body deserves better than you have been giving it.”

So, more rest, more exercise, more vegetables, less processed food, and more delegating means that I feel great.

The end.

It is brown and firm, baked to a hardened shell

Fingers dance on it, then glide

Smoothing it out, caressing

The surface is as smooth as glass,

still water, finished cement

It is young, taut, unquarrelled with the world.

There will be expensive lotions,

dirty fingers, manicured nails,

short shorts, miniskirts.

It will ask for 7 minutes

in the icy blue glow of the UV rays,

and it will wait patiently while baking.

It becomes a solitary addiction,

adding layer upon layer of tanned skin,

before it finally ages and cracks,

making crocodile patterns down the knees and ankles.

It will mourn for itself

and spread fingers wide over photographs of its youth,

before being scooped away by a Doctor,

who specializes in removing,

the trend and vapidity,

of a time that didn’t matter.

~aw

Ive been thinking a lot lately about my knees. They hurt. A lot. Almost all the time.  From the outside, they could be the plump knees of just about anyone, but on the inside they are my knees and a mass of grinding, cracking, popping, throbbing anger.

I am too heavy for my knees. Very much so. They’ve been telling me that for about 2 years now by waking me up in the middle of the night with hot, and then icy, stabs. My balance is different too.

I’ve decided to lose some weight and I don’t want to be one of those obsessive people who only talk about what they are eating and weigh themselves all manic-like every day. I also don’t want to feel bad about my body so I won’t.

This process has been slow in the making but I’m a week into it and already feel lighter on my feet….er, knees. I have cut WAY back on the junk food intake, started drinking a ton more water, and have bought a bunch of little plastic blister pack things full of thinks like jello, green beans, oranges, lowfat pudding, and yogurt.  I’ve also taken to eating lots of salads and those weird (but very good) Marie Callendar steamer things for lunch (at only 390 calories each!)

I plan to incorporate some activity into my day as well, even if I just bring my tennis shoes and make a lap around the parking lot after work. This is a huge campus so that could take a while.  I’m pretty sedentary so I know that I can’t just go out and run a marathon but I know that dedication on a day by day basis is key.  My schedule is crazy right now with work, the BFP Reunion, multiple other web projects, and life but I think that my body is telling me to make it a priority, so I will.

This isn’t about vanity for me because, let’s face it, I’m pretty friggin’ cute

More than anything, I just want to feel better. In a small way, I already do.

Tomorrow is Independence Day. July 4th. A country-wide celebration of the United States of America gaining independence from England.

People will be grilling hamburgers and drinking beer. There will be fireworks and lots of “America, Fuck Yeah!”. People all over this country will celebrate a day off of work, the right to own a gun, the right to vote. Millions of us will celebrate.

Im feeling kinda sad about doing any celebrating this year. There is a certain guilt in celebrating the independence and greatness of this country when there are so many people’s lives in limbo who live here, or are trying to live here. Racist laws being passed in Arizona, LGBTQ citizens still not being able to marry the people they love, unemployment sky high, and a Mother Earth gushing in the gulf.

Patriotism. Im still patriotic and I still love my country but I long for the day when I wake up and every single citizen of this country has the same rights. I long for the time when people, no matter their class or race or education will all be seen as equal to the government and to each other.