Passing a milestone and some general grumbling.

Well, we made it through the July 4th weekend largely unscathed, except for an acute case of the grumpies from being kept up late last night by our idiot neighbour kids behind our property setting off M80s and M100s well past eleven. It was like we were in Kabul. One of these nights, I’m going to get up at 3 AM, go out to the Prius, stealth it all the way around to the road behind us, pull up to the house that’s 90% of the time responsible for all the noise, and just lay on my horn until every light goes on. Then I’ll stealth away back to bed. Maybe I’ll do it a few nights in a row at varying hours (but always very late hours) just to be evil. I’ll also be sure to do it during the school year. Little jerks. When not setting off fireworks, they’re tearing up the road and our peace and quiet with their piece of junk dirt bikes, or screaming like howler monkeys in their back yard late into the night. I’m not sure if there are actual parents present, they could be hog-tied in the basement for all I know for all the supervision those kids get. I feel like such a curmudgeon, but gawd! I just want a quiet weekend after spending all week driving through a sea of idiots to my job. Peace and quiet!

At least there were no questionable renters next door. We had a quiet lady who had two quiet, well behaved dogs. Monday, I set up the little round picnic table on the porch, opened up the small parasol and the two matching director’s chairs. I pulled my dress-form Mathilda off her stand and carried her out there and sat her in the other chair. I took a bottle of cold sparkling water (my favourite beverage), my laptop, which was immediately turned on and navigated to Netflix to watch the Stargate Universe second season. I brought my Ginghers, a spool of white cotton thread, my needle, my jar of pins and I scooted Mathilda over in her chair and started stitching. I’ll be posting a project description, but honestly, I haven’t been taking progress pictures so I’ll have to rely on finished product pictures and drawings. Suffice it to say, it was A LOT of stitching. You’ll know why it was so much soon.

All the while, I was being harassed by demanding and territorial squirrels, baby stellars jays that seemed to enjoy making dorky-sounding noises at me, band-tailed pigeons that accumulated in huge numbers when I was quietly stitching away, but would explode into the air en masse if I leaned back to stretch my back or stood up to go to the bathroom or whatnot, and the cat, who seemed happy to just wind around my feet and pace along the bench beside me until I shooed him. He then curled up on the bench in a spot of sun and left me be on the most part. All of this was intermittently punctuated by what sounded like mortars and grenades going off here and there, with the occasional crackle of a less destructive firework. I told my husband that we could easily get away with shooting out random tires or windows out with the shotgun because people would think the blasts were M100s going off. I still think we missed an excellent opportunity to go on a wanton destructive shooting spree, obliterating other people’s property. I’m just saying. We’ll have to keep that in mind for next year. ::kidding::.

Gross.

Weight watchers wise: These past two weeks I was annoyed that I was unable to breach the 20lb mark, it’s a milestone you know? I idled at 19lbs for several days and then I weighed myself on July 4 and today and lo and behold, I was at the 22 pound mark. Just like that. Go figure. I hopped over the milestone and went for something lighter I guess. Yay! HOWEVER, Dan took pics of me riding bareback on Tag on Sunday, and suffice it to say, I do not *look* 22 pounds lighter—but the scale can’t be lying to me. It’s just hard for me to see it. I see it in my husband though. He’s shrinking into his clothes like he got hit by some shrink-a-tron ray or something. Me... not so much. I’m down two sizes, my bras are getting looser and less effective and my pants keep sliding down my derriere. I’m losing about 1.3lbs a week. Only a gazillion more pounds to go I guess. ::groan::. I just wonder how come staying at a healthy weight was so easy when I lived overseas? I ate like a horse! If you’ve ever been to Belgium well... The Friteries! Hello! I used to eat those at least once a week, a huge pack full of huge fries with mayo! No weight gain! I move to the US, and PPFFFFT I blow up like a pufferfish, and have had a hell of a time with it since. First the depression weight gain, then quitting smoking (am in my tenth year btw sans smokes) was a killer, added at least 20 lbs... and the Atkins diet where I lost so much weight super-quickly.. that diet was just a terrible mistake. I gained it all back with more pounds to boot for my effort – not to mention just how unhealthy the rest of me felt from all that protein. ::facepalm:: I just want to look at a picture of myself and not detest what I see. Whenever I start feeling good about the progress I make on this diet, I’m reminded that it’s not moving fast and that changes are not coming quickly enough. It’s so disheartening! People say they see it but I think they’re just being nice. I don’t see it at all.

But hey, maybe I’m just being too hard on myself. What else is new? At least I’m losing weight. I was recently told that the reason why it’s harder for some folks to lose weight is that some people are just meant to be a certain weight. I don’t buy that. If I buy into it, what am I consigning myself to a lifetime of feeling unhappy with how I look and feel, and I’ve experienced life as a person of average size, and it’s so much better than this. But mostly it’s the sense of inevitability. A few years ago, my husband’s favourite aunt went out to the chicken house to feed the layers, and she never made it back inside. She was 52 years old and she fell over onto the henhouse floor and died of a myocardial infarction. At age 52.

I don’t want to die at 52. Hubby doesn’t want to die at 52. An early death... it seems a lot to give up for the momentary pleasure and comfort of something as transient as food (or booze, or whatever damaging thing that can kill you if taken in excess). It’s just not worth it. Even if I failed and gained all the weight back, I can know I tried, and I’ll also know that it’s in my power to change the way I feel about myself. I just need to discipline myself and do it. And god knows the good intentions of the people in my life who say I should love myself as I am, that’s fine if you can. But I can’t. I am not happy with ham-arms. I am not happy with thick thighs, I am not happy that I can’t cross my legs, or that I look like a potato on my horse. I hate my double chin, I hate that I have visions of gowns and costume pieces that just look awful on me no matter what I do. Some girls can pull off the curvy kewpie doll—I’m not one of them. I look dumpy. I hate it, and no matter who tells me *my* curves are sexy; it feels like a big lie. Some people live many years healthily overweight some keel over and die. The truth is, my infertility is directly related to my weight. My depression is related to it. My anxiety is related to it, hell even my confidence as a writer and an artist is impaired by the way I look. Will I ever be happy with the girl in the mirror? Maybe not. But I was a lot happier looking like this....

"And I raaaaan, I ran so far awaaaaay..."

....or this...

"Taaaaaaaaaaake ooooooooooon Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee - take ON me..."

...or this...

"I blessed the raaaaains down in Aaaafrica...."

...than I was looking at the person I see today. Which is scary. Because it was the 80s. I guess sometimes you just have to wake up one day and realize it’s time to change things.

I know I’m pontificating again, but I need to pep-talk myself sometimes. I need to remind myself that there’s the light at the end of the tunnel. There’s a world of adorable clothing that isn’t priced to the high heavens because sellers like Lane Bryant and Avenue know full-figured girls will suck it up and pay for it if they want to wear anything besides Wal-Mart crap. There’s a world where shopping isn’t an experience that makes you feel worse about yourself. There’s a world where you don’t get grumbled at every time you visit your doctor, and lectured like an obstinate child. There’s a world where you can wear shirts above your belly or without sleeves and not feel like you’re the most disgusting thing on earth. There are long boots that would fit my calves, airplane seats would be so much more comfortable, I wouldn’t be afraid to model my own costumes. I would feel okay about wearing a bathing suit.

The only benefits of being overweight:

• The d-bags of the world generally ignore you or pretend you’re a non-entity if you’re size 12 or up—so that’s a plus.

• If you puff yourself up to look even bigger, nobody will sit next to you on the plane.

• Fewer people will crowd into the elevator with you.

The list of drawbacks could go on forever. So I won’t go there. Happy short-week all. ;)

The HC