I never put much stock in those Dr. Phil types who rattle on about how the difficulty in dieting is always related to some underlying, as-yet-unrevealed internal turmoil.
“Why are you eating when you’re not hungry?” they’d ask. “What shortcoming in yourself are you masking with food?”
“Horse Phooey,” I’d say, opening another bag of chips. “Can’t a guy just like to eat? Can’t he enjoy going out for a few wings and cold ones without needing therapy?”
But as the years have crept up on me, so have the other questions:
“Why do I still need to burn the candle like I did when I was in my early twenties?”
“Shouldn’t I be doing something more productive with my time?”
As the ticking of that clock grows louder, we all inevitably begin to wonder what the sum total of our lives will be; how we will be judged either on this plane or the next for what we have accomplished.
I’m beginning to doubt that the highest pile of wing bones or the loudest or longest belch of the night will register very high against that scale.
“Do I fear that if I act like an adult I might actually have to be one?”
“Am I hopelessly clinging to the routines of my youth, a Peter Pan lurking on the inside who never wants to grow up?”
Damn you, Dr. Phil.
Of course, the talk is cheap at this time of year when it comes to losing weight or living a more healthy and productive life.
But something’s different.
There is a realization that a time has come; that a change is past due; that true grace comes from the comfort of living in the skin you’re in and not the one you used to wear decades ago.
Peter Pan must die.
Who knows? It might not even be a bad thing.