Today is Fat Tuesday for Roman Catholics. It is the day before the start
of Lent when traditionally the sugar in the house was used before the fasting
period. These days it’s an excuse to buy super fattening special doughnuts
made for the occasion and eat what you want. So I decided to talk today
about something Americans are obsessed with; fat. It was back probably
around 2001 when I was watching Entertainment Tonight with my wife and they
showed a poll of several thousand women. They asked them, “If you could
have any star’s body, who’s would you choose?” At the time the
overwhelming first choice was Britney Spears. As soon as they said that my
wife said, “Ha, I bet she’s not happy with her body.” I was confused and
asked why. She said, “No woman is 100% happy with her body.” That
floored me. That can’t be true, I thought. My wife is perfect.
So many women are absolutely beautiful. How could that be? Ever
since then I have taken a non-scientific poll of female friends and asked them
if they were happy with their body. Nearly every one of them told me they
were too big here or too small there or there was too much fat in this
area. I didn’t see what they were talking about. Then I started
listening to my male friends and they were unhappy with their bodies too.
They had the same list of complaints except in different areas. The
biggest difference was that men were usually less inclined to do something about
their weight. Our society condemns anyone overweight. Women are
particularly held to an unfair higher standard, it would seem. They are
expected to look like some size 0 supermodel. In the movie “The Devil
Wears Prada” the main character is ridiculed for being a size 6 which I am told
is not very big. I have always been heavy. When I was having a
health screening for my insurance I was shown a chart stating just how obese I
had become. As bad as I felt about the number, I looked at where I needed
to be in order to be “Normal” on their list. At 6 feet tall I needed to
weigh 135 pounds. When I was starving in college for lack of money I
wasn’t even that light. The old excuse is that “I’m big-boned.”
Well, I do have broad shoulders and a large frame. I am still way
overweight right now but those tables they use to figure your weight do not
reflect different body styles. It’s like saying, “Every vehicle should
have a 4 cylinder engine for better gas mileage.” What about big
sedans? What about SUVs? What about trucks? We can see the
wisdom in that but are harshly judged by those tables. I think they are
purposely adjusted to make people pay higher health insurance premiums and
frighten them into losing weight so they won’t have as many trips to the
doctor. Lighter people in good physical condition tend to lose fewer days
of work. It’s not like I try to make poor choices when I eat but as many
of you know, it is hard to eat healthy. In the morning I am usually in a
rush and have a bagel on the go. Recently I saw that my innocent little
bagel had 600 calories in it before I even put cream cheese on. That’s
over a third of my daily allowance of calories in a few bites. I’ve tried
cereal but I am usually hungry an hour or two later. The bagel seems to
stick with me longer. Since restaurants are the places that display the
calorie content, let’s stick with them for lunch. If I get a Jimmy John’s
sub, it’s nearly 1000 calories. I might as well have gone to McDonald’s
where I can buy my grand-daughter a Chicken McNugget Happy Meal with the same
number of calories. I will work on my weight, but in the meantime I won’t
look at the calorie content in restaurants. As I seem to enjoy saying,
“Ignorance is bliss.”
of Lent when traditionally the sugar in the house was used before the fasting
period. These days it’s an excuse to buy super fattening special doughnuts
made for the occasion and eat what you want. So I decided to talk today
about something Americans are obsessed with; fat. It was back probably
around 2001 when I was watching Entertainment Tonight with my wife and they
showed a poll of several thousand women. They asked them, “If you could
have any star’s body, who’s would you choose?” At the time the
overwhelming first choice was Britney Spears. As soon as they said that my
wife said, “Ha, I bet she’s not happy with her body.” I was confused and
asked why. She said, “No woman is 100% happy with her body.” That
floored me. That can’t be true, I thought. My wife is perfect.
So many women are absolutely beautiful. How could that be? Ever
since then I have taken a non-scientific poll of female friends and asked them
if they were happy with their body. Nearly every one of them told me they
were too big here or too small there or there was too much fat in this
area. I didn’t see what they were talking about. Then I started
listening to my male friends and they were unhappy with their bodies too.
They had the same list of complaints except in different areas. The
biggest difference was that men were usually less inclined to do something about
their weight. Our society condemns anyone overweight. Women are
particularly held to an unfair higher standard, it would seem. They are
expected to look like some size 0 supermodel. In the movie “The Devil
Wears Prada” the main character is ridiculed for being a size 6 which I am told
is not very big. I have always been heavy. When I was having a
health screening for my insurance I was shown a chart stating just how obese I
had become. As bad as I felt about the number, I looked at where I needed
to be in order to be “Normal” on their list. At 6 feet tall I needed to
weigh 135 pounds. When I was starving in college for lack of money I
wasn’t even that light. The old excuse is that “I’m big-boned.”
Well, I do have broad shoulders and a large frame. I am still way
overweight right now but those tables they use to figure your weight do not
reflect different body styles. It’s like saying, “Every vehicle should
have a 4 cylinder engine for better gas mileage.” What about big
sedans? What about SUVs? What about trucks? We can see the
wisdom in that but are harshly judged by those tables. I think they are
purposely adjusted to make people pay higher health insurance premiums and
frighten them into losing weight so they won’t have as many trips to the
doctor. Lighter people in good physical condition tend to lose fewer days
of work. It’s not like I try to make poor choices when I eat but as many
of you know, it is hard to eat healthy. In the morning I am usually in a
rush and have a bagel on the go. Recently I saw that my innocent little
bagel had 600 calories in it before I even put cream cheese on. That’s
over a third of my daily allowance of calories in a few bites. I’ve tried
cereal but I am usually hungry an hour or two later. The bagel seems to
stick with me longer. Since restaurants are the places that display the
calorie content, let’s stick with them for lunch. If I get a Jimmy John’s
sub, it’s nearly 1000 calories. I might as well have gone to McDonald’s
where I can buy my grand-daughter a Chicken McNugget Happy Meal with the same
number of calories. I will work on my weight, but in the meantime I won’t
look at the calorie content in restaurants. As I seem to enjoy saying,
“Ignorance is bliss.”
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