It's Not You. It's Me.

I'm writing to tell you I can't see you anymore.

I know that writing a letter is a punk move.  I should be doing this in person, but I can't handle it right now.  I still find you irresistible and if I see you now, you and I both know where that will lead.  The mere sight of your golden brown skin makes me lose all sense of reason and self-control.  I'm just plain reckless around you.  Remember that time on the stairs?  Breaking up with you is the only way I can cope with this strange addiction.

Please know that you didn't do anything wrong.  I knew from the start that this could end badly.  You warned me that dudes were always getting sprung over you and that I would do the same.  I  knew you weren't looking for a lasting relationship, just a good time.  I should have listened to you then.

The simple truth is that you and I are toxic together.  The adrenaline rush I feel when we are together is always followed by regret and despair.  As much as I love you, and I do still love you, I am tired of always having to undue the damage that us being together causes.  You are who you are and I know I can't ask you to change.  So I must make a change.

Please believe me when I say that it's not you.  It's me. So, French fries, I have decided to give you up forever...or least for a little while.

What did you think I was talking about?

A Better Man

A few years ago, I glanced across the room at my young son realized that I was staring at "Mini Me."  Frequently, I would catch him mimicking my mannerisms, no matter how subtle.  He would use the same words I would use at times.  When I would behave badly, he would behave badly right along with me.  I did not set out to teach him any of those things.  I thought to myself, "uh oh."  He is going to be who I show him I am, not who I tell him to be.

When my son was three years old, one of his favorite games to play was "Shoulders." In "Shoulders," my role was to hoist my son on my shoulders and then run the length of our backyard until HE got tired.  Needless to say, "Shoulders" was always a quick game.  One of the reasons "Shoulders" never lasted very long is because my son was a big 'ol boy back then, almost unnaturally big.  He was a load to put on my shoulders!  As all Daddies do, I would also look at my son and fast forward into the future.  


In my mind's eye, I saw a him as football player, a defensive end with bad intentions.  I saw him coming around the end like a freight train, blowing up the QB, scooping up the ensuing fumble and running 57 yards to the end zone, putting more space between he and the competition with each stride.

As he reached the end zone, he looked up into the stands to look for me, but saw only an empty seat where I should have been sitting.  You see, this was his tribute to his late father, me, who passed away years earlier.

When I snapped out of that daydream, if it can be called that, I looked at myself in the mirror and saw someone I would not want him to be - at least physically.  And I knew he was copying my every move.  So if I wanted a different future for him tomorrow, I had to be different today.  I wanted him to be able to look at me as the blueprint, not the cautionary tale.

Why do I stay fit?  Why do I get up at 4am or sometimes earlier to work out?  Why do I work out when I used to sleep?  Why do I moderate when I used to indulge?  Why do I find a way when I used to find an excuse?  


My children, my son and his little sister, make me want to be a better man.  

I'm Just Big Boned (Fatback and Jelly Rolls)

Somewhere along the way, I stopped trying to bullshit myself.  My line was that "I come from a long line of short -and wide - folk," so I was born to be fat.  I could resist it for a little while, but long term, I really has no choice in the matter.  That's the way I used to feel about my body.  I was just "big boned."  And then I finally came clean.

I used to be 10 pounds stuffed in a 5 pound bag!  More specifically, I was 230 pounds crammed into a mere 65 inch skeleton.  Genetics were not my problem.  My problem was that I loved beer and chicken wings more than I feared my mortality.

The brutal truth is that I chose my fatback and my jelly rolls.  I chose the hot dog folds on the back of my neck.  I chose all three of my chins and each and every one of my 230 pounds.  I took me years to understand this, but when I finally did it was liberating!

Because if I chose fatback and jelly rolls, it was within my power make a different choice.  Choosing differently is not easy, it's never easy, but it least it was an option.  I finally embraced the message of something my father likes to say.  When he is playing the role of the Cranky Old Man and feeling particularly ornery, one of his favorite lines is "the only two things I have to do is stay Black and die."  Being fat is not something I have to be.  And that was a revelation!

Somewhere along the way, I decided that I was a product of my past choices, not my genetics, so-called bone size, metabolism, gland problem, culture, upbringing, busy schedule or any other foolishness I used to tell myself.  I decided that if I could just string some good choices together long enough, I knew I would be living in a new reality.  And today I am.  And I have discovered that my bones are no larger than anyone else's.

Are you big boned too?  Isn't it funny that one's "bone size" seems to be perfectly aligned with how much they love beer and chicken wings?  I'm jus' sayin'...