Tag: body image

I Ran

It’s cold again this morning, and I really didn’t want to get out of bed this morning. The cold is unpleasant, and it does kind of effect my mood. Yesterday was most emphatically not a good one; nothing worth complaining about for any one single thing, but any number of little things going wrong that snowball until by the end of the day I didn’t want to be around people or even be on-line or do anything other than sit in my chair, doom-scroll, and watch Youtube. The evening was essentially wasted, but I feel like I did manage to be functional around the office yesterday and get my job done. It was so cold! I had ice on my windshield yesterday morning and no scraper, but once the defroster warmed up it made short work of that wretched ice and I headed for work. Several of the bridges around the metro area were closed–the causeway and the Boggs Bridge over the river in St. James or Charles or Jean le Baptiste (I like how that sounds in French better than in English). Schools were closed, and there was no traffic, either in the morning or in the afternoon. I drove all the way uptown on Claiborne from the office to get the mail, and managed to get there and back to the house in less than half an hour–and I wasn’t speeding. Paul wisely worked at home yesterday, not venturing out into the cold at all. I also watched the second part of the Real Housewives of Salt Lake City reunion, which is kind of interesting.

I also wasn’t in the mood to read last night. I hate when I have days like that, and I was also spiraling by the time I got home. It was deeply unpleasant, and it’s been a very long time since that’s happened. I don’t know why my new meds decided to stop working, but that’s the kind of thing it’s supposed to not allow to happen. I really don’t like spiraling, and the worst part of it is that I’m aware that it’s happening but there’s nothing I can do to make it stop. But it remains a good reminder of how much better I’ve been doing and how much happier and more relaxed and less anxious I’ve been since changing medications. I also hardly ate anything yesterday, which is always an indication that I am really stressed out, too. My eating and stress are inevitably tied together; I’m not sure why that is but it has a lot to do with a lifetime of body image problems. One would think that by age sixty-two I would know better and wouldn’t fall back so easily into bad habits and bad behaviors, but here we are.

It’s also Pay-the-Bills Wednesday, and due to the vagaries of how pay periods fall when there are more than two in a month, this is kind of like an extra paycheck; a few bills to pay but otherwise a little flush. I’m going to try to be wise and save some of it for upcoming medical bills–dealing with my wonderful new insurance plan was part of yesterday’s idiocy; suffice it to say Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana is still the same piece of shit health insurance company they were when I gladly said farewell to them fourteen years ago, only to have them show up again like a fucking herpes chancre on the tip of your penis. Humana wasn’t great by any means, but when I think about how I would have had to fight Blue Cross/Blue Shield for every penny for my surgery and recovery time, I thank the Lord they were still my carrier last year. I have also now found myself in the same boat so many others have found themselves in: having to work for the health insurance, and the day job gradually taking so much time and energy that my other sources of income suffered, to the point where I now also can’t afford to quit my job. Yes, that’s my American freedom: unable to leave a job because I need the insurance, no matter how shitty and useless it actually is.

I don’t want this for the younger generations, either. They deserve better than what my generation had, not worse. That was the American dream I was raised on–where each generation is better off than the one before. That really isn’t true anymore. I honestly don’t know who the people are who can afford the rents in New Orleans, let alone buy property. Owning your own home was the cornerstone of American prosperity, because that was the seed from which all generational wealth grew for the middle class. How can you buy a house when your student loan debt payment is more than a mortgage? Why is college so expensive, and why are administrative expenses rising while academic expenses in univerity budgets are being cut regularly? So kids are spending far more for an education that isn’t as fully rounded as it used to be, and plunging deeply into debt for careers that won’t allow them to ever see daylight. I mean, you can pay off a mortgage, but student loans? Good fucking luck. I thank the universe every day that I never had student loans. Isn’t it malpractice to charge more in college fees and tuition and other associated expenses than the student will ever make in that field in a year? Shouldn’t someone be telling students this so they can actually make an informed decision about their future?

Capitalism has been exposed over the last forty or so years as a fool’s game, and it’s destroying our country in the process. Greed and selfishness is the real American way, and I really don’t think our Constitution gives people the freedom to exploit and scam others. Capitalism and Christianity do not go hand in hand, either; capitalism should be the antithesis of Christianity, and anyone preaching the so-called “prosperity gospel” is teaching heresy.

Le sigh. And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Stay warm, Constant Reader, and I may be back later.

Dirty Laundry

Tuesday and soon enough I’ll be heading out to the dentist for my final fitting of the dentures–which means the next time I go, I will actually get them and be off this hateful soft food diet once and for all. I’ve kind of gotten used to it, though–but as much as I will miss the pint of ice cream, I can still have yogurt and the super-hot-and-spicy ramen on top of everything else. I think I am going to give myself to the end of the year–since I missed out on so much unhealthy food since the surgery–before I change my eating habits in order to be healthier going forward. The New Year will also be about six weeks after the surgery, so hopefully I’ll be in better condition by then to actually go ahead and change the way both Paul and I eat–Paul already eats much healthier than I do; so I just need to adjust mine a bit. But I can cut the ice cream out, as well as some of the snacking. Popcorn is really healthier, and it’s not hard to make, either. And I like it, just as I like pretzels, which are also healthier than chips (I think). At any rate, I need to spend some more time in the kitchen figuring out how to cook things I’ll like that are good for me.

And every once in a while, I can make Swedish meatballs or shrimp-n-grits as a treat…

Yes, because looking at food as a potential reward/treat is completely the healthy mindset I should have.

I’ve always had issues with my body and with food, for that matter; a lot of it stupid, a lot of it a product of my malfunctioning brain, and part of it from being, well, shamed for not being in the best physical condition possible. I don’t know when it all started, but I know when I was in high school–when I really started paying attention to male bodies–that I wasn’t built like other boys, and certainly not the ones all the girls were madly crushing on (for the record, I have never, nor will I ever, understand straight women’s taste in men), so I began thinking there must be something wrong with my body. I did eventually stop doing sports and so forth once I was in college, and that was also right around the time my metabolism slowed down from what it had been previously, so I gained weight–and I’ve never really been right in the head about my body and weight management ever since, I’m over sixty now, of course, and a lot of that body image stuff is in the past–but I do sometimes see pictures of myself and cringe at how big I look, which is patently absurd on its face and a mentality I need to get rid of once and for all. This soft food diet has helped me drop some extra weight–about ten pounds or so at this point–and I bet I lose even more after the surgery. Note to self: you need to buy a wagon to carry groceries in from the car, since you won’t have the use of both arms for a while.

It’s below sixty this morning and we’re having a middle of the week cold snap, even getting colder than fifty theoretically tonight. It’s also supposed to rain throughout the day. I am off to the dentist in a little while, so it’s one of those wretched days when I have to run all over town throughout the day, which is fine. I woke up this morning at five–and of course, Tug did his usual morning leap over Paul onto me and curled up on my pillow at around five-forty-five, waiting for the alarm so I would get up and feed him. He really is adorable, and loves to play like all kittens do; I need to buy him some toys, is what I need to do, and several laser lights because he got hold of the original one I bought and it’s disappeared, probably either under the couch or behind something. Maybe I should either swing by Petco or order something from their website to be delivered. I think he’d love one of those birds on a stick things; he was playing fetch with one of Scooter’s mice last night. But he’s adapted completely now to being our indoor cat, and he definitely feels like he is King of the Castle. He’s also curious about everything and still fearless, climbing under the couch or the dishwasher or wherever he can get–and he loves getting into the cabinets. He also broke my lunchbox yesterday; he knocked it off the counter after I packed it, and the clip for the shoulder strap broke. Sigh. I had to order another one.

I also got some book mail yesterday: Adam Cesare’s Clown in a Cornfield 2: Frendo Lives and Lisa Unger’s Christmas Presents. Lisa Unger is one of my favorite writers, but is one of those I always forget to mention when people ask me about favorite authors in interviews and things. I read some more short stories from Alfred Hitchcock Presents Stories That Scared Even Me, and they were okay; more morbid and weird than anything else, but interesting. One was “It” by Theodore Sturgeon, which was very peculiar and strange but was kind of fun to read (even though a dog dies terribly in it) and “Casablanca” by Thomas M. Disch, which was interesting; about an American couple visiting Morocco when a nuclear war breaks out between the Soviet Union and the United States, and how things change for them during that period, as they slowly lose their ugly American haughtiness and privilege. It was difficult to feel sorry for them because they were so awful and so used to their being American being a magic ticket that they become nasty and unpleasant as they begin to realize that being American means nothing anymore. It was kind of haunting to remember that paranoia we were so used to living with when I was a child; that fear that at any moment bombs would be incoming that would change the world forever; the American cultural obsession with nuclear doomsday when I was growing up was really something and popped up in movies and books and stories all the time. The one I remember the most (literature wise) is Alas Babylon, and the movies–Testament and The Day After. When I was in high school PBS ran a documentary about the possibility of nuclear war and what it would like; which was when I learned nuclear missile bases dotted the Midwest and particularly Kansas–the abandoned missile base just outside of Bushong in north Lyon County was actually mentioned in the show as a target despite being abandoned in the early 1970’s (that missile base shows up in my story “This Thing of Darkness,” and sometimes I think it might be fun to set an entire book there–high school kids exploring an abandoned missile base only to find something horrible and deadly there), which was all we could talk about at school that week–the morbid fascination that out there in the middle of nowhere Kansas we were still Soviet targets.

Ah growing up in the second half of the twentieth century was such a joy.

And on that note, I am going to get showered and cleaned up and head for the dentist’s office. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again later.

Shambala

Thursday afternoon, home from work and the grocery store. It’s overcast outside–there was a monsoon earlier, but no flooding–and I am really glad I made it home before it starts pouring again. I really should be putting the groceries away, but it’s so hot and muggy outside I wanted to just sit for a minute before I get up. I also have laundry to do, and might as well get started on the slog of cleaning the kitchen/office/living room. Heavy heaving sigh. I also want to do some writing or editing this evening before I give up for the day and start dinner and relax.

Storms clouds have rolled in since I got up and put away the groceries and put the laundry into the dryer. It’s weird because I can visually tell it’s darker outside–if I turned off the kitchen lights it would ridiculously dark–but when I look up out the windows through the crepe myrtles next door,  all I see is blue sky and white clouds.

Ah, New Orleans weather and its many peculiar vagaries.

Shit, I just remembered there are clean dishes in the dishwasher. Be right back.

Okay, that’s one, and I have Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys playing through the stereo unit in the Lost Apartment (those harmonies!) As I look around at the kingdom of my office, I spy things that need to be put away, things that need to be handled, things that need to be put away. I’m also kind of avoiding my email inbox, because I also don’t want to deal with any of that, either.

I’m still thinking about Laura Lippman’s lovely essay that I read the other day, as I continue to struggle to get a grip and handle on everything I’ve managed to again fall behind on.

One of the more interesting–perhaps curious is a better word–things I’ve noticed over the course of my lifetime is the change in what the cultural definition of what is (or isn’t) sexy when it comes to men and masculinity. I can remember when I was a kid that bodybuilding was primarily seen as the province of queers; I’m not sure how or where I became aware of that, but I know the eschewing of weight lifting for men (and younger men) was not something that was a cultural norm; health clubs didn’t really start proliferating until, best as I can recall, the late 1970’s/early 1980’s. Even then, the idea wasn’t to get ripped or cut or to have a six pack, it was just to have a bigger overall physique.  I don’t remember how old I was when I began having a love-hate relationship with my body; I joined my first gym in 1981. Over the course of the next ten years I joined several others; I never lasted more than a few weeks. I wasn’t particularly motivated–I wanted to look better and feel better about myself, but I found the weight room horrifyingly intimidating and gyms not particularly welcoming. I am sure some of that had to do with the PTSD acquired as a tween and teen with gym class, athletics, and everything to do with those things. I tried several times, and it never took.

I always blamed those failures on my own laziness. Now, though, I am beginning to wonder about that more; if there was more to it, on a psychological or subconscious level. I know when I joined a gym in January of 1995, I was determined to accomplish change, not only in my body but in my life. I also joined a gay owned and operated gym; which was not only welcoming and friendly, but kind of nice. Everyone who worked there was friendly and available to answer questions and help. That made a huge difference. I liked my gym, I liked going there, and the changes I was seeing in my body–I was also on a very strict eating plan–were enough reward to keep me going. And I also noticed that the way I was treated in general was better–bartenders, servers, sales clerks, even the passengers at the airport–were friendlier and nicer to me the more my body shape shifted and changed. I was very dedicated to this self-improvement kick; I also have a tendency to be obsessive when I become interested in something. When I lost my job at the airline, I decided the next step in my career would be to work in health and fitness, trying to help people who were like me and pay it all forward.

I fell off the fitness wagon about ten years or so ago; primarily because I injured my back and also started working full time outside of my home. The adjustment to finding time to work out around a forty-hour work week, a brutal editing schedule, and an insane writing treadmill (which led to the publication of a ridiculous amount of novels and short stories over a highly productive few years) made finding time to workout more and more difficult. The injury didn’t help…and I would always try to come back too soon and aggravate the obviously-not-completely healed injury. I even hired a trainer to make me go to the gym–I’d keep appointments, even if I couldn’t be bothered to go to the gym at other times. A few years ago the tightening of my finances and the need to buy a new car forced me to let Wacky Russian go as an expense, which sucked…because I’ve never really been able to find a rhythm for working out again since then. I keep meaning to go…but then I am so tired, and I can’t keep up with my writing and my emails and my cleaning, and then…

Yes, excuses. I can always find them. Never fear.

I’m also going to be fifty-eight next year. I am not as concerned as I was when I was in my thirties whether other people think I’m hot–or as Laura said in her seminal essay, “fuckable”–and ironically, doing it for my health, to improve my sleep and my energy, doesn’t seem to be motivation enough to get me to go. I am not, after all, going to hang out in the Quarter all weekend long with very little clothing on during Southern Decadence, nor am I going to pick out a slutty Halloween costume, or go out dressed nearly naked as a masked professional wrestler again. But feeling better–and I always do after I work out, after I stretch, etc.–should be enough of a motivator to get me to go. And yet, somehow I will always find some kind of excuse for it (I intended to go during my Staycation a few weeks ago; then I left my headphones for my phone at the office and since I couldn’t listen to music–I can always find an excuse) and wind up not going.

Repeat after me, Gregalicious: three times a week is optimal, two times is better than one, once is better than none.

So, my plan is to give it another shot this weekend. I do miss the gym, you know. I miss watching other people work out and making up stories about them in my head. I miss the smell of the weight room, the clanking sound the weights make, the friendly people who work at my gym, and even the water I drink–I hate water, don’t drink nearly enough, and working out forces me to drink it.

And on that note, I am going to try to get some of this mess cleaned up and maybe even do some writing.

Have a lovely rest of your day.

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