Scraping By, Lifting Off

The marked decline in the frequency of my posts can be attributed to various home restoration efforts being undertaken as unusually fair weather settles in our region.  In particular, my sister has enlisted me to patch and paint the surfaces of an upstairs guest bathroom, tending additionally to the removal of a small plot of drab linoleum now covering wooden floor beams original to our home's 1847 construction.  I have been preparing the walls by scouring and peeling layers of paper, removing hardware, then filling chinks and other cavities with calcium carbonate spackling medium.  Next, I intend to sand and prime before proceeding with the final finish, a blue-silver tint surprisingly similar to the base coat revealed at fiberboard level.  I have photographed my latest entry, scrolled upon the very surface I have been tasked to improve.

Author's admission: The "'forbidden' tastes" referenced above included difficult foods, true, but  they were ones I have learned to incorporate as a necessity for staving-off weight loss.  Basically, they are the "light" carbohydrates/dairy products standard to my diet in times of reverse-restriction:  reduced-calorie chocolate soy milk, Lactaid® cottage cheese, and, over dry popcorn, nutritional yeast, I Can't Believe It's Not Butter spray, salt.  It is inaccurate and irresponsible, as your narrator, to say they are taboo.  A year ago I, when I was surviving primarily on steamed vegetables and multiple heads of lettuce, they were indeed seen as indulgent.  However, in more recent months I have come to depend on them almost exclusively.  While the ice cream is indeed new to my regimen, the only other outlier introduced that night, being radically out of the ordinary, was a minor cluster or two of my mother's granola.  I am becoming more liberal in my reluctant pursuit of weight gain with permitted rations, and that is why I felt need to exaggerate.  Even minor portion increases  are an achievement over past, inflexible protocol.

Despite last night's pronounced efforts to challenge intake in both kind and quantity, I have subsequently been burdened by a heavy blanket of fatigue, a weariness normally reserved for days following willful fasting.  I am not of the mood to question the cause of this energy drain; I will attribute it, for now, to an awakened metabolism and my usual movements around town, in which I travel on foot to expend calories while fulfilling (admittedly trivial) errands.  I feel as if my body is pleading for rest; I must grant it a release from the compulsive "power walks" required by the ingrained tenets of weight management I now seek to reverse.  Normally, discipline dictates I cover both a long and short route before permitting the first of two large daily meals, but today I opted to write this overdue update in lieu of detrimental activity.  This is an even greater feat for me when considering that I currently have our full property to myself for the weekend, a privacy that affords the use of my mother's recumbent bicycle.  Instead, I choose to reset exercise levels to as low as possible, perhaps two moderate periods in total.  For at least today I surrender to natural instinct and the call of reason.  For at least today I will not pursue numb exhaustion, in company with hunger, as a personal marker of achievement.

Just Desserts: An In-Progress Art Series of Edible Americana

Offered here is my continuing collection of still life art pieces intended to both mock and celebrate iconic mass-produced American "convenience" foods, juxtaposing what might be described as "lowbrow" lunchbox fare with elegantly-composed presentations. Such confections as Twinkies, Pop Tarts, ice cream sandwiched, and Zebra Cakes are served upon ornate silver platters; dramatic lighting and floral accents are employed ironically. The photographs shown in the second half playfully draw attention to recognizable children's snacks and attempt to provoke closer examination of symbols and figures disguised within (especially as seen in Lucky Charms cereal).  Note: These digital images were initially intended as guides for future work, but I feel they merit display without further rendering. I intend to finish additional canvases and am currently experimenting in collages based on advertising of the 1940s-60s.  I am eager to sell, and all are available for purchase (with the exception of the divided Hostess Cupcake, which went to a friendly local couple after my first public show one year ago this September).  Apologies for any cavities or canker sores that may be summoned (if not sweet dreams).  Be warned:  hyperglycemia and/or sticky fingers are also a risk of extended exposure.  Just call me the Sugar Plum Fairy.

"American Amuse-Bouches" or "A patient's muddled perspective of Renfrew shaded by bewilderment, resentment, and the passage of six years" - Acrylic on 16" x 12" canvas, late 2010

"Missed Opportunities" or "Too Late" - Acrylic on 16" x 12" canvas, 2011

"Cone, Alone" - Acrylic on 12" x 9" canvas, July 2012

"A Good Hostess" - Acrylic on 8" x 6" canvas, May 2012

"Centrifugal Forks" - Mixed media collage
(photographs, Restoration Hardware catalog images, mid-century LIFE Magazine pages, ballet pink spray paint, white acrylic house paint, Mod Podge) on 20" x 20" canvas, June 2013

 

For additional works in this series, see:  Art Attack!

Freedom (From Want, From Fear, From Myself)

"You don't like what's being said, change the conversation." - Don Draper (Jon Hamm), Mad Men Season 3, Episode 2

Generally speaking, mood is directly proportional to to the threat level and pervasiveness of our most pressing concerns.  It is also true that a person's disposition can be altered somewhat by peripheral encounters, not forgetting chemical changes that impact emotion, aroused by natural hormones --or even drugs such as alcoholic spirits.  The simple resupply of blood glucose from what we eat or drink can transform one's bearing dramatically, as demonstrated by the highly successful Snickers ads touting the slogan:  "You're not you when you're hungry." (In one thirty-second television spot, a football player, Mike, is seen performing poorly on the field.  He is compared to --and thus portrayed by-- nonagenarian actress Betty White ...until he takes a bite of said candy bar, restoring his image as a virile thirty-something.)  Superficial and/or fleeting activities can provide a similar burst of energy and distraction.  This, in essence, is the purpose of shopping, should it not be for any immediate need (a.k.a. "retail therapy").  But the most surefire way to adjust an unwavering and unshakable humor --good or bad-- is to tackle the grievances that plague us.  An altered perspective, like a disruption of wind to water, is the guaranteed repercussion of reaching outside of ourselves.  Whether this refreshed frame of mind is an improvement depends on how our actions are received.  Whatever the case, experience has taught me that doing something, when the intention is pure, is almost always better than making no move at all.

By providing an example of a healthy, engaged, well-adjusted woman, my sister's continuing presence has made me hyper-aware of my many defects and foibles.  It is easily observable that she is unsettled by my odd relationship to food, although I provide a range of lesser idiosyncrasies that could act as compounding irritants.  I am notoriously secretive in our household about what and when I eat, and this concerns those who know my history of self-starvation.  To ease my family's worries, I have been making efforts to sip or nibble on things in front of them, even if not at my normal allotted meal times (which, to be fair, are at admittedly bizarre hours).  I have engaged in very late lunches and dinners over the past handful of years because I do not permit nourishment if my daily OCD rituals are not completed.  Given that these routines involve multiple errands and chores, many designed for maximum physical impact, it can be quite late in the day when I finally submit to my exhaustion and mounting hunger.  I am mainly admitting to this here because I have been working to disregard, where and when I can, my self-enforced restrictions, as they prevent me from participating in the fluctuating, unpredictable properties of a normal existence.  Indeed, "normalized eating" is a key focus of most treatment centers, and can involve the usual "who, what, when, how, and why" of our approaches to dining.  I took a big step and consumed a bowl of ice cream (albeit lowfat) in front of my sister when one of our activities took place during my feeding hour.  What she may not have known is that I went on to have additional foods immediately after our return home.  That I did not limit myself to a mere dessert when my body craved better satisfaction is actually the greater accomplishment. Breaking the rigidity of embedded rules is the only way I might remove the handicap this disorder has served me with.  I have not contributed much to this blog in the last few weeks because I have been, for the most part, emotionally "checked out" --not wanting to think about the clear mess I've made of my life, to engage or correct its manifold problems.  In addressing what is wrong with myself I risk upsetting the delicate disconnect that allows me to avoid paralyzing grief and mortification.  But that is a real and deep reaction that comes from honestly assessing a situation in need of serious correction, and is at least preferable to an otherwise anesthetized state of denial.  Fear and discomfort are signs that I am exiting familiar, well-trod grounds for more exotic, uncertain terrain.  

Patrolling unfamiliar lands was  something of a hobby, in fact, of Theodore Roosevelt; it was this robust politician and famed safari gamesman who fiercely noted, "Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty...  I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life.  I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and lived them well."  According to his friend, historian Henry Brooks Adams, Roosevelt was indeed "pure act".  He saw life for the taking --at times quite literally, as Teddy is still remembered for his hunting trophies.  Tomorrow is Independence Day; I can see no better means of tribute to our twenty-sixth president than to forgo my usual schedule and to "break bread" with my extended brood over our traditional pre-fireworks feast:  baked wild salmon, freshly shucked peas, royal blue and red rascal potatoes, assorted berries over vanilla ice cream --finished off with tall champagne flutes and sparklers, each one as golden and explosive as the other.  If I want to graduate from this extended melancholy and to perhaps hear others speak well of my condition it is necessary to adopt this Rough Rider's example, wrestling the "bull by the horns".  In his 1913 autobiography, Roosevelt described his approach to foreign policy as one built on "intelligent forethought and decisive action sufficiently far in advance of any likely crisis."  Given my low weight and long-abused system, the most "likely crisis" I should seek to avoid is one that would have me placed within a hospital for supervised "refeeding" and intensive therapy.  This, at least, is preferable to an even worse bed:  a crisp-cold drawer at the local morgue.

Self-portrait with Glow-Specs.  (They were found abandoned in front
of our house on July 4th, following the fireworks.)  Feeling depleted
after a relatively light meal with the family, I sat down to a kale-berry
smoothie and chocolate soy milk at 10:45 pm ...after this was taken.