Lessons in dignity

Every few months I find myself at odds with who I thought I was a few months ago.

In varied and colorful terms, a host of people I consider fairly intelligent have used several comparisons to tell me that they think that I have an obvious and glaring flaw: I am a fat-head. The reason that this comes right after the declaration of my ever-changing nature is that this is the one thing that has remained constant in my friendly neighborhood psych eval.

You know that charming young man who becomes a drunk brute by the end of the party, when the bar closes? In a real bar, thanks to my mountainous genes, I am never that person (or haven't been since I graduated from St. Someone's College of Blender's Pride). But in the bar of life (I just really wanted to start a sentence like that), I am growing into that person. The unruly slob who accidentally knocks over a gorgeous scotch glass with a thick camelot and looks dumbly at the broken glass, with a ketchup-smeared white shirt, incapable of picking up the pieces.

Enter girl. The archangel of constructive criticism. The patron saint of affirmative action. The scourge of whiners. The defender of all that is good in what we belittle as mainstream. The anti-fat head that the legend would have us believe.

 The problem with normality is that, for most people who read fantasy literature and watch Mafia movies, it isn't aspirational. Unless you attach something to it. A fat paycheque. Two kids. A fat paycheque and two kids. Or if you're really lucky, you find someone gorgeous and petite, with curly hair and a full mouth, who assures you that normality doesn't necessarily mean a resignation from a spirited definition of life. Someone who allows you to do multiple philosophical somersaults so you can reach the conclusion that there isn't really anything troubling you besides the fact that Middle Earth is not really a place and you can't be the Godfather when you grow up. Someone who allows you to create enough of a mess, to want to clean it up. Someone who knows when its time to leave the party; someone who knows to book a cab before-hand and understands the importance of changing clothes and brushing teeth before 'passing out'.

I eat carbohydrate-rich finger food before I drink now, use paper napkins, maintain a regular supply of mouthwash at home and only dance till the music stops.

I have always known how to make an entry. I want to thank you for being the only person I've ever known who taught me a thing or two about how to make a dignified exit.

 My secluded,ever-derisory (limited) intelligence bows humbly to you.