Beware the Blast

Well, I didn’t exactly start off the day like I said I wanted to. I did drink the huge glass of water before drinking (probably four cups of) coffee. That was a good idea and I intend to do it tomorrow.  I let the dogs out to pee but I didn’t go out with them. It was too cold and frosty out there and my cozy bed was too welcoming. I’ve been slacking on the Morning Pages and I did again this morning. That’s a shame because I’ve been doing them faithfully for most of ten years now. And I did check in on social media before even pretending to do any real work. But at least there were no “Skype dates” and I’m headed to bed tonight after a day with zero sexual activity of any kind. This is the first day that I’ve been able to say that it quite a while. I did check in with my writing accountability partner this morning but we didn’t check in tonight so that’s an open bookend— not the point or the purpose of doing it. It was working well so it only makes sense that I would stop.

God, all of a sudden I’m in a bad mood. Maybe the food. I just ate the leftover cheeseburger I didn’t eat at lunch because I’d already filled up on tater tots and chicken wings. The food thing is sort of out of control again and I haven’t been to the gym in two days. For months I’ve been doing pretty good with eating clean but it’s sort of “gone South” here lately. I’ve been trying to be good but in moments of weakness— well, you know. Mom and I were about to head home tonight after buying a mattress and she said, “You know, I’d like a (I don’t remember what they’re called) from Sonic. Would you pull in there and let me get one?” Well, once we pulled up to the little car-hop ordering station, Mom decided she wanted a sundae in a waffle cone instead. All the while I’m saying to myself, “Jeff, you don’t have to get anything. Your leftover cheeseburger is at home and that will be more than enough” but sure enough when Charlie Brown’s teacher came on the other end of the speaker I said, “Yes, I’d like to have one of those (and again, I don’t remember what they’re called— hell, hang on.) Blast. They’re called a Sonic Blast. Beware the Blast.

I ordered a large just because the Jack’s Hamburgers larges are barely enough to get me going so I figured these would be too— but when Veronica skated up to the car (not really)— when Betsy lumbered over to my truck, she was holding what looked like a styrofoam vase with a dome that looked like an astronaut face mask on top to hold in all the gooey goodness that was trying to escape before I ate it. I’d ordered the “Caramel and Brownie” version actually thinking the word “brownie” might refer to the warm cake-like confections historically referred to as “brownies” but the morsels they had sprinkled on top of my frosty-frozen heart-attack-in-the-making looked more like deer droppings than anything but I can’t imagine that deer droppings would taste this bad. They were basically like little squares of cardboard that had been dipped in “chocolate luv” flavored car freshener liquid. So you’d think I’d chalk my wasted $4.50 up to experience and ditch the dairy disaster, yes? No way. Because those chunks of whatever just happened to be suspended in the “caramel” part of the “caramel and brownie” and that part— well, let me just put it like this: surprisingly enough I have never tasted heroine but if heroine doesn’t taste like that burnt-sugar lava they were using to disguise the “brownies” with, it sure as hell should.

These two substances were also floating on what purported to be whipped cream but upon further investigation proved not only to be non-dairy but also non-food. You’d think at least by this point I would have given up but remember I went to war under the Rodeo Clown who kept yodeling out “stay the course!” until we’d damn near broke the world. Quitting while I’m behind just doesn’t seem to me in my nature. I knew that underneath the 2 parts awful, 1 part opiate at the top, there had to be some real milkshake under there somewhere so I kept plumbing into the icy depths trying to find it. Eventually I did find it and I decided that the rest of my fat/sugar sacrifice was going to be make solely for what could pass as a good ole God fearing all-American milkshake.  I ran the narrow red plastic spoon down through the hole I’d carved out of the middle of the whipped crime and gingerly withdrew my medication from the frozen depths of the vase. I felt like I was playing that Milton Bradly board game “Operation” which, coincidentally was born the same year as I was. The game went on to greater fame and success than I did. (Who needs em?!) Slowly and carefully trying to withdraw the uncontaminated milkshake through the hole in the toxicity made me feel like I’d be teleported into the 1970s version commercials for the board game. I could almost heart the other white kids (huh? huh? never saw any black kids in those commercials did you?) — I could almost hear the other white kid say, “Take out his baby batter for $200!” Did I mention I’m driving my four-wheel drive pickup with my knees during all this? I hit a pothole and the buzzer sounds. “Butterfingers!” Mom descends the stairs, “May I play?!” God, wasn’t that mom in those commercials so annoying? No Mom, you may not play!

And of course, how can I think about surgery and such for very long without remember that Adam, the man who— oh fuck it. I’m too tired for that. Suffice it to say that he made a hell of a lot more than $200 for the “spare ribs” he took out of somebody today. What was that, Adam? “Just help me do this med school thing and I swear to God I’ll make it all worth it for you?” Yeah, I’m still waitin’ on that one buddy. Looks like I’ll be waiting a long, long time.

You listen to me right now, reader, especially those of you who are in recovery. Never, ever, get into a relationship with a drug addict/alcoholic who is newly sober or needs to be. If you do after my strict warnings, you get exactly what you deserve— just like I did.

So I think of Operation while I’m mining for milkshake and thoughts of how Adam fucked me over come up and then I remember I haven’t been to the gym in two days and how I’ve been eating like crap and that I’m leaving for New York in ten days with no money, no job, and no place to live and I find that I’m just shoveling the milkshake in faster and faster and I’m no longer avoiding the nastiness on top bur rather tossing it all down my throat as fast as I can hoping beyond all hope that this frozen concoction can possibly offer me what a Jack and Coke once did. No such luck. And I figure, “Hell, I can always hit the eject button when I get home.” No! I absolutely refuse to ever flirt with that shit again. I (basically) dodged the bullet on that particular manifestation of addiction (after flirting with disaster more than a few times) and I chose not to push my luck.

I think what I’m faced with here is (at least) two fold: 1) I’m having unpleasant feelings that I don’t want to feel (anger, resentment, fear, grief) and so I’ve been trying to medicate them with food and 2) I’ve mentioned this a little bit before in the blog but often when I set out to better myself in some (or a lot of) ways, I’ll do great for a little while and then it all topples. I think that represents some sort of self-sabotage which actually has its roots in consciousness— low self worth wrapped in bravado —and what I think I deserve.

I’m slowly making steps forward toward correcting the things that got me into such a fix on September 1. In some cases it feels like two steps forward and one back. At least the general direction of travel is headed toward where I want to be.

Tomorrow I’ll make better decisions around the food thing and get my ass to the gym so I don’t fuck up the one thing that’s been going most right in my life!! 

Thanks for your continued support. Do you have food stuff to? Other challenges around fitness? If so, I’m praying for you tonight too. We got this. Hang in.

See y’all tomorrow!