Please Keep Trying!

I started my book yesterday. I told someone the other day how hard it would be to write this book, and not because it’s a book. Writing for me is fairly pain free, thankfully. It’s having to relive how I became who I was and made me who I am that’s hard.

Some people gain weight because they don’t care what they eat; as long as it tastes good, screw health. Some people don’t know any better and/or have learned bad eating habits from themselves or other people. Then there’re those folks who use food as a substitute for something else, usually psychological or emotional. My weight gain was because I fell into all three categories, like I’m sure many people do.

My problems started at an early age when I was told to eat everything on my plate or else. OK, I need to make this food disappear to go out and play? Is that all? Presto! The food is gone and I gained another pound, but playtime is good to go! That wasn’t even a fraction of the experiences which ultimately made me as heavy as I was, but the incident is still crystal clear in my head, down to the smells, temperature, and clothes I was wearing. It’s a start.

The chapter I started yesterday actually goes back to my childhood, when bad habits were learned or a price was paid; a steep price. I had a decent childhood, in my opinion. I traveled the globe thanks to my father’s career as an Air Force officer, and I was indulged in my interests. However, it was tempered with some really, really dark times. If I balanced out the good and the bad, the bad far outweighs the good. By far.

The good times were great, though. I was introduced to Nature by my father which in turn helped me become the person I am now. That’s the one thing I always carried with me from that time; my love of nature and the earth. Everything else was burned on the bonfire of the past. Seriously, one day I gathered all the deadwood in my head and heaped it together:

Oh, this is a huge piece of “Hey fat ass!“, and whew, I ‘ll need to cut this “You better get good grades!” into smaller kindling. Then, Whoosh! I torched my experiences. I haven’t forgotten them; the ashes are still there, and they still evoke some modicum of emotion, but only if I really focus on some particular. Otherwise, I can look back and gloss over those bad bits, and even condense the good bits into one happy big experience. This book is a big homage to “Lest we forget.” Even if this thing never gets published, it’ll do me more good than years spent talking to therapists about my youth.