Day 16: Food For Thought

Something interesting, and very telling, happened tonight. I had gone into San Francisco to see my best friend, Dave, and his girlfriend, Kellie. We went out to dinner at Max's, a deli famous for its singing wait staff. Luckily their menu included some low-carb meals, and I ordered a chicken melt on low-carb bread that came with a huge chopped salad with a lite, but delicious, dressing. I ate everything on my plate, including the giant pickle, and was stuffed. It was easily the fullest I had been since starting the project.

Driving home afterwards, though, I began to grow more and more despondent. At first I had no idea why. As I unsnapped my uncomfortably-tight pants, I wondered if this depression could be caused by my recent near-encounter with romance. No, that wasn't it. Maybe it had something to do with Kellie rolling her eyes at every crude sexual innuendo I'd made that night. No, that was just par for the course. I loosened the seatbelt around my distended belly and considered the possibility that being in the city had reminded me of performing my one-man show "Happiness," there. Maybe I missed that. But that wasn't it either.

As I pulled into my driveway, I suddenly had this overwhelming urge to rush into my house and make a giant chocolate sundae. "Fuck it," I thought, "I've eaten so much tonight, what difference will it make if I just gorge myself now?"

And then I got it. Even though the meal I'd eaten that night was relatively healthy, it made me feel the way I used to feel when I ate too much crap. I wanted to defy my guilt by rubbing even more food -- even more unhealthy food -- in its face. For a moment I was a defiant child, staring into the eyes of a parent, thinking, "You don't control me! I can do whatever I want!"

Sometimes, when life pushes you to the brink, when you feel as though you can't take any more, you take hold of something you love and break it. It's a childish way of showing how nothing matters to you any more. I'm just beginning to realize that the thing I've been grabbing all of my life, the precious thing I've been smashing to pieces, is me.