No Man's Land

For the last two years the spectrum of numbers displayed on my scale has covered a scant five pounds, and that is speaking generously.  In truth, its readings have primarily vacillated between a close handful of units separated by mere fractions.  I realize this sounds dubious, but I have been loyally recording these numbers, planning to incorporate the pages they claim in some sort of eventual art piece --much like a tourist might photograph the cell wall etchings of a decommissioned prison.  In previous entries, it has been emphasized that I find comfort in the familiar --be it the food I consume, the territories in which I walk or work, the sites I view online, the faces with whom I interact-- and my feeling toward weight fluctuation is certainly no different.  If anything, it is the impetus behind my staunch inflexibility-- the fear of a transformed self.  Not that I see my body or being as anything close to perfect.  On the contrary, I actively yearn to fill-out areas of my face, arms, and concave ass; to improve and expand my skills, comprehension, and professional/personal identity; to contribute more, taking less.  Paranoid and exacting weight maintenance would be more justified and understandable if I were at my intentioned goal, approximately ten pounds higher than my current level.  And I am not ignorant to the protestations of others, namely health practitioners, when it is said I should multiply that stated target by a minimum of 150%.  It is simply that in the last decade I have never reached beyond that figure, including at point of discharge from more than one inpatient facility.  It represents my appearance when included in a Seventeen magazine modeling shoot held on my college's Manhattan "campus" (or approximation of which, given NYU's intermittent territories within the city).  I remember discreetly disguising a bony chest with the wardrobe I self-sourced, although upon latest review I am surprised my neck wasn't more of a concern at the time.  The issue was released October 2003, with exactly ten years now past.

My myopic perspective of personal body size is defined and perpetuated by way of the digits relayed to me each morning, and these rarely fluctuate beyond tenths of a point.  For that reason I have been a bit dismayed and caught off guard by a sudden jump in heaviness that occurred roughly two weeks after committing to a decidedly revised routine.  Virtually eliminating exercise, remaining still for most of the day standing at an assigned art table, has finally made a difference after a tremendously long period of unmodified and resolute steadiness.  It is no doubt obvious to the reader that I have been resisting change by committing the same protracted workouts, along with upholding a fixed diet slow to expansion.  Because I am still rather protective of the latter, it is all the more imperative that I consider myself on a footing only slightly above "bed rest", the recommendation of most doctors for someone in my condition.  From here on I am exploring uncharted territory and must accept my new base level (which, when previously touched, would signal a day of elevated starvation).  Its repeated appearance has confirmed that hitting the number was not a fluke or mechanical error.  On the contrary, it is a sign of progress, of maturation and evolvement.  I enter these grounds trepidatiously, but, thanks to the small audience collected here, I can know that together we are complicit in pushing beyond steady, fatal infirmity.