Here are the things that have been on my mind this week:
My Fitness Pal – Like Oprah, in the past I used to use the season from Halloween until the Epiphany as the Super Bowl of eating. What did it matter, why did I bother to watch what I ate in between the tent pole days of Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year? It was a jumbled mess of days, tautly knotted as a ball of yarn.
I used to weigh close to 200 pounds. This was decades before #bodypositivity and #mybodymychoice.
I grew up in a time when you were judged harshly for your weight (I know this is still the case but I’ve seen #celluLIT and I marvel). My loving, extended family used to say things like, “You’d be so much prettier if you weren’t so heavy”. They rarely asked about school or my hobbies. They concerned themselves with my looks and whether or not I had a boyfriend.
This is what mattered.
Fast forward a few decades, and though I’ve come a long way (and lost about fifty pounds naturally), I still have hang-ups around my weight.
Those neural pathways run deep.
In August I started using My Fitness Pal to track my meals. It was helpful because I’m a citizen of Finish Your Plate, and a part-time employee of A Nibble Here and A Lick There.
I felt sluggish and lumpy – and not in a body positivity way. In a way that made it uneasy to move.
With cancer behind me and as I round closer to my 50th Birthday, I want to feel well.
But as with many things, I can get hung up and obsessive. And even though the diary is for me, I might omit things if I think the food is “bad” or if I go over the calorie allotment for the day.
Omit things from who? And why? It’s my diary and I can write what I want in it.
Yet those codes that were programmed into my psyche are hard to erase.
What I’m trying to get to is acceptance without judgment or guilt. The food isn’t bad and I’m not bad.
I tell the girls not to hide their food, but when I omit food from the diary I’m hiding food.
So, it’s a process. This coming to terms with my body, its preciousness, and that my sense of worth isn’t tied to the way it looks.
That what I value is a highly-functioning organism, that my role is to cooperate with it.
I want to feel about my body the way I feel about the body of a dear friend who has gone through cancer twice in the last three years.
I just messaged this to her, “i love you and have no attachment or judgment about your body. i’m just happy your body still exists because it is the temple of your holy spirit, and i love your holy spirit.”
same, lu. same.
Dapper Day – Starting today my youngest daughter and I are heading to Dapper Day at Disneyland!
Daylight Savings Time – is it on? Is it over? I can’t tell…all I know is that now the sun sets about an hour after we get home from school and by dinner time it’s pitch black. Didn’t we Californians decide to cancel DST? Just pick one and stick with it.
I applaud the 125+ countries that do not observe DST. If we all just wait, it will even itself off. I get irritated by the idea of humans trying to control something that is natural. Like Christmas decorations and music the day after Halloween. But maybe that should be #2.
It’s the abrupt shift that I struggle with. I’m disoriented, out of space and mind. All week I feel behind and late. Even small things, like my hunger signals, are disrupted. Walking the dog at the end of the day is a different experience.
I normally cruise the dog beach and head home as the sun collapses into the sea. Now, I arrive at the same hour as before, but the sky already looms grey and foggy. I won’t have enough time to make my loops before it gets dark.
Yes, if I look on the bright side (which is earlier in the morning now) DST is a reminder that I can shift and change.
But in an effort to limit my positive toxicity, I don’t want to look on the bright side! I just want the day to evolve naturally.
I wonder what that would be like…to live in a country that doesn’t observe DST. To let the season come and go as it was before humans stamped on their preferences.
I’m going to think about that for a while.
Christmas Decorations and Music the Day After Halloween – Poor Thanksgiving, gets all the wind taken out of its sails because we are busy focusing on what we will buy. Capitalism, sheesh.
Beyond that, there are other religious and secular celebrations between 10/31 – 12/25. I wonder what it must feel like for them, who don’t celebrate Christmas. I’m a big proponent of spirit, so I understand that this is more related to the desire to celebrate and honor something special, to set it apart.
This is, in fact, what Holiday means – Holy Day. And we can use the definition of holy to mean something sacred.
But what part of it is sacred? Do we feel like we’ve lost that? I feel like we have.
How can we recapture the sacred, the holy part, of this season? More people are moving away from religion, at least in the traditional, conservative sense.
Perhaps we can find new ways to honor. There are lots of us sharing this planet and this space. We have different views and preferences. We can open up the arena and invite more people to play.
For me, I love how it gets dark and cold. It encourages me to stay in, with my warm loved ones. I want to honor that – the time, the change, the distinction between what was and what is. How I’ve changed in the last year. The lack of light spurs me to look inward. What’s in there? Who am I? How am I? Where and How do I fit in the world?
“Sea Fever” by John Masefield – a poem perfect for this weather and this season. It’s a total mood.