On Scales, Mirrors, and Notes-To-Self

I made a huge mistake. What did I do? I stepped on a scale. “Big deal!” you say, reader? Well, it was rather a shock to notice the numbers continued past their time honored end point to a number I have never before associated with my own mass. I stepped down. I checked the zero/tare of the scale; I stepped back up. The same number stared back at me. For the sake of science, I participated in a third trial. Yup – there it was again. The precision of that scale was marvelous! I wasn’t sure about the accuracy though, so I went to find another measuring instrument. The result was similar to the first scale. This scale, too, has marvelous precision. My self esteem could not handle repeating the experiment a third time, on yet another scale.

This caused me to take a long hard look at myself in the mirror. Mirrors are funny things, for though they create a reflection of you, a mirror-image, the way you perceive that image depends on many factors. Are you in a good mood that day? Is the lighting good? Is the mirror surface dirty or flawed in any way? What did you have for dinner that evening (this is a confounding factor). The image that stared back at me was not the image I would have liked to see. I have been grumping at said image for quite a while. Months have passed where I have perused my person after a shower and made a mental note to ‘do more sit-ups’ or ‘attend to my posterior’. Said mental notes tend to fly out of the brain the second the clothes are donned. For you see, the clothing that I have owned for the last few years still fits. It’s stretched with my own image. It’s old, and wearing. As I sit in the chair and write this, though, I notice the bulges on my tummy that used to not be there (or not as prominent, anyway). Yes, the clothes still fit, but not as well.

The scale and the mirror are in agreement, something is changing. Perhaps that change isn’t rapid, and that is probably the worst part. These changes have been sneaking up on me with every meal eaten out, every day of missed or neglected exercise, and each forgotten a-for-mentioned note-to-self. I need to do something about the scale, and the clothes, and the mirror. And I intend to start now.