I started blogging as a way to chronicle Bob's and my journey to healthier happier humans. Both of us need to make some changes in our lifestyle, one is doctor ordered, the other is for solidarity AND because one does not eat vegetables and keeps reading about the what veggies can do to prolong your life, keep you healthy, avoid illnesses, blah, blah, blah. The word that is giving us both a run for our money is (say it in a tinky*, tiny, little voice very quietly so no one will hear) c h a n g e.
Change. Didn't Obama use that as part of his political platform? And the only change I want from him is the kind that stays in my piggy bank. Young moms probably talk the most about change but that conversation quickly 'changes' into a conversation about poop. As in 'I changed little Joey's diaper yesterday and there were raisins in there.' Interesting how they re-plump upon exit isn't it? Which proves the point I'm eventually going to get to, even raisins are resistant to change, their last ditch effort is to get back to being a grape before it's too late.
I'd have to say most conversations about change involve 'but I don't want to.' I am with you on this one. Changing is hard. I hate it. I resist it. I spend more time trying to figure out how to avoid it than the time it would have taken just to change. Changing is a bit like being pregnant. It starts as a little nugget inside you and you are a little bit excited but mostly you are freaked out. Then you settle in and realize you're going to have to deal with this but you think, I will keep it inside for as long as possible, before any real action has to be taken. And so for nine months it grows and grows and makes us uncomfortable and becomes the only thing we can think about. So encompassing that it begins to make even the easy stuff difficult to complete. Eventually we become resolved to the fact that this has to come out. And we know that the exit is going to be painful. And after all the screaming and crying and screaming and cursing and screaming and praying. It is born. And it is wonderful and we think how on earth could I have kept this beautiful thing inside for so long?
Now I am not saying that once you accept the change you are done and your life is a peaceful calm place and you live happily ever after. Far from it. That one change leads to many others and the course of your life is permanently altered. Some days for the better, some days for the worse.
People say when it becomes more difficult to suffer than to change, then you will change. We all know, change is the only constant. More will come.
"It's not a diet, its a lifestyle change" is not working, it feels like diet. It's hard work to cook healthier and it involves vegetables. The excuses for why we are not changing are infinite. Last night Bob and I went to the grocery store after work to pick up the healthy ingredients we needed for dinner. We came home with 18 pounds of Easter candy. Bob somehow started us out in the Easter candy aisle. "Let's make Easter baskets for the girls." My logic is that all the girls would rather have money than candy (they are 17 and older), let's save us the pain of resisting the candy for an entire month. So I tried to stop this. "But it would look pretty all set up as decoration on the table." I think this is a good idea as long as we don't eat the candy until Easter, so that it remains a decoration for the next month. Do I know somewhere in my subconcious that this is not going to happen? Yes I do, but I am going merrily along anyway.
Later this week we are going to be packing for our trip to North Carolina to see Bob's parents. He is going to be packing shorts. Shorts that he has to try on. When the bewilderment starts "Why are these so tight?" "Do you think they shrunk from the dampness in the basement?" "Somehow, someone has gotten into the basement and switched out all my old shorts for smaller ones, who does this stuff?" I am going to show him this picture.
*tinky, my made up word for the day. It means smaller than small and just naturally goes with tiny.
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