Yesterday was a bad day.
It was cold. I did a little volunteer work in a large concrete warehouse – not hard work but it was cold – and I showed homes for a few hours to some of my real estate clients. Cold.
Cold does two things to me. It makes me tired. It makes me hungry. The hungry part is what gets to me.
While I was working in this warehouse (it was a big book sale type thing) one of my fellow volunteers came up to me with the hot news that she had bought in some homemade empanadas and banana nut muffins. Yummy. When I went back to the “break area” I noticed that there were also some store bought ginger cookies and fennel/sweet pepper rolls. All things sweet and chewy.
Did I mention how much I like things sweet and chewy?
Needless to say, the empanada went into my mouth – dough, ground beef, etc. – and one fennel/sweet pepper roll and two (count ‘em two) ginger cookies. OK, I thought. I’ll go easy on dinner.
Dinner was left over Chinese food with some rice from a box. Only, what I thought would just be a small amount of Chinese food turned out to be quite a bit since my wife had bought home some from her lunch at work. That was quite a bit.
The real kicker was when my wife wanted “share” her leftover Chinese food with me.
“No thanks,” I said.
“It’s too much for me,” she said.
“That’s OK,” I said, ” I have enough already.”
“Just a little,” she said. “I’d like to share some with you.”
Here’s the bottom line: when you’re fat (like I am) people think you want to eat more. Friends that are volunteering with you shove food in your face. Friends you’ve known for a long time shove food in your face. Spouses shove food in your face.
I think they have good intentions. They see the fatness and think that’s the way you want to be. All the while tsk tsk’ing how out of shape you are. Or, in the case of my spouse, misery loves company. She, too, is circumferentially challenged. She must be one of these secret eaters since I hardly see her eat that much when she’s in my presence. She’s very good at wanting to “share” and never wants to throw anything away until it becomes a science project in the refrigerator.
It’s pretty tough telling your friends and your spouse, “No”. You want to be nice. Polite. But, you need to be firm and unwavering. Sometimes they insist. They keep asking, again and again. ”Just a little.” “I’d hate for this to go to waste.”
It’s all a variation of the crap from our youth – “Eat all your food. There are starving children in [Africa, China, India, you take your pick].”
Fighting this battle may be harder than counting calories and exercising.
