WEIGHT LOSS and ECSTASY...

The other day I climbed onto the bathroom scale. Why? because it was there. And because I had had the surprise of my life when it registered 165 recently. Imagine my surprise and delight when I read: 161. Now I had been wrestling recently with the six months to a year of my imaginings, and had come around to the position that if this is what it took to get to three months, the next three couldn't possibly be as bad: no separation, no moving, no coming out to family members who act like idiots... maybe I can do it after all.

And here I was, not just approaching Radar's target BMI, but right on the money, halfway between my former 178 and the 145 I weighed before I was married, back in the Mesozoic era. If I could do three, maybe I could do six; if I could see 161, there might be a hope of making 145 again. That would be almost unbelievable. And well worth however much money I had just spent on pants with 34" waists... I walked around in a little pink cloud of euphoria for several days. For all the nightmare aspects of my life, "this was living!"

Hallelujah.
Praise the Lord.
Pass the ammunition...

So this morning, I decided to revisit the scene of my former triumph, and stepped back onto the scale, hoping to see that 161 had made way for... what? 160 and BMI Homebase? Who knows? Well, I got both feet settled and peered down -- 165. In other words, nothing had in fact changed for weeks except that I had seen some freak occurrence where either I had completely dehydrated or the scale had chewing gum stuck in it, or something. sigh.

So, I breathe deep. I can't really claim to be surprised. I haven't been walking for weeks, and haven't put up the chin-up bar [it took me the better part of a month to figure out that there was one place in the house where the ceiling was not too low to put it up], and haven't even put up the bookcases which are the closest thing to exercise that I really can't avoid...

This just in.

Just when I had finally [and quite rightly] decided that I was a complete nincompoop to trespass on people's good intentions, and Jaime's in particular, by requesting a post-mortem on our purely electronic relationship: he replied. Very nicely, actually.

I have clearly decided to move on -- and find a soul that I can be intimate with. Not a one-nighter or a "buddy" but a true soul mate.That means the guy has got to be available. Not playing around on his wife, his partner or himself.

Playing "angel" with someone who's four hours away and only wants to "chat" isn't high on my list of priorities when I have so little time to meet people. [this had to do with his claiming to be an angel by day and a demon by "nite", to which I had responded that I would at this point rather meet the day avatar] I'm pretty certain that I'm being honest with you in clarifying this so you understand where I am and why I may not have such a great interest in travelling to meet. I've made mistakes and learned from meeting people here what works and what doesn't -- for me. Your clear signals of uncertainty and hesitation are all understandable and normal -- very much a part of the process.

Well, that is not only a first for me, a kind of bittersweet testimonial to what had seemed like a connection, but it also hit me hard, and here's why. Unless he's lying about his age -- and I am slowly coming around to believing that I am the only one on-line who isn't -- he is only two or three years older than I am, and all he can hear is, in Uncle Andrew's immortal words, "time's winged chariot hurrying near." Well, I am just stupider than the average bear [no offense intended to you bears out there, or to us bear fanciers, for that matter] -- I wrote back. And said, among other things, like "thank you":

Time is the air we breathe -- it expands and contracts within us. And if you look through the other end of the telescope, you might see that you have all the time in the world -- once we have no time left, our "world" is over in any case. But from now till the end of the world is a long time, no matter how you slice it. Breathe deep.

Well, I am sorry that we couldn't at least meet. I have this fantasy that meeting people without looking for that soulmate is the way to find him -- it's like all the things you turn the house upside down to find, but only find when you stop looking. I know this sound INCREDIBLY stupid, but please stay in touch -- let me know how you do in your search. I am rooting for you all the way, from... four hours away.

Well, I do wish them well, even the Professor. Jaime was allergic to Republicans but self-identified as a preppy, which seems almost a contradiction in terms [actually, I rather like contradictions in terms, generally, and in people specifically]. The Professor, for all his liberal politics, had a speed-boat and drove an SUV. Go figure. My next coffee date is actually a teacher at my old high school, which is not far from here. And while trying to find his e-mail address, I ran across his picture on the school website.

OH. Why does it matter to me that he's bald? I've known and liked bald guys all my life. But fall for one? Maybe this is God's way of paying me back for the whole Decent Interval thing... Well, I can't help it -- I have a hard time picturing being in love with a bald guy. Though it's nowhere near as bad as someone who dyes his hair, and hair cropped close enough to be as good as bald is a big plus in my book...
We all have our little wrinkles.

My wrinkes, by the way , got a serious perspective adjustment at a recent local "leather night." And while it's true that they may not go as deep as I had once thought [more on this one later] they are still more than skin-deep, that's for sure.

Hang in there.
And: "Don't drive like my brother."