The Old Gray Mare

I ain’t what I used to be.

I became many things in the thirteen months that it took me to rappel down the 251 pound mountain to land in the 146 pound grass. I became an athlete, a working stiff, a fiancé and a heterosexual. I also became a happier woman and a better mommy, though I think that had more to do with Howard and DS than with my weight. Or maybe it was the loss of all the adipose that allowed me to move more freely in the world that my surroundings had created. Either way, I emerged from fatness, changed forever.

It occurred to me in the first rays of Goal Weight that I’d lost way more than 105 pounds. In addition to all form of self-doubt and self-loathing, I shed a number of things that I had long thought to be true about myself. In what I will call the ad hoc memorial service for the Fat Lady, here are a few things that, along with being fat, I just ain’t no more:

Slow

My brain fires on 12 cylinders at all times unless I’m at an outdoor rock concert (it’s a contact high!), but my body moved slowly. It always has. I went to college on 500 acres and always had to leave my dorm 10 minutes earlier than everyone else, just to make it to class on time. I didn’t walk so much as I sauntered, or later, shuffled. I crinkled my nose at people who clipped along, or walked at what seemed to be the speed of sound. My pace never quickened, even when I thinned---until now. A couple of weeks ago, I did a panel discussion in the Loop, and, when it was over, I realized that I hadn’t brought enough cab fare for the trip back to the train station, so I decided to hoof it along the main route, walking until I found a no-fee ATM and then taking the Turbo Trip in the next yellow car I saw.

As it happened, I never saw the ATM. A few minutes into my walk, I figured that I had enough time to make it all the way to the station. It was just over 2 miles to the station and I had about 40 minutes. I figured if I walked at a decent pace, I could make it with 5 or 10 minutes to spare, allowing for traffic lights, speeding cyclists and the inevitable obstacle course of panhandlers along the way. I kept walking toward the depot, switching directions when I hit a red light so I could keep moving. I walked at a comfortable pace-quickly, but never to lose my breath or to break a sweat (I was in a suit and had to go back to work). I made it all the way to the train station in 20 minutes, with 20 mins to spare and nothing to do but breathe diesel fumes until the commuter showed up. But I had all my breath and I’d managed a little workout besides. I’m not slow anymore. My standard walking pace is now 3.0 mph. Pretty cool.

Afraid

Fat makes you a lot of things, and for me, one of them is afraid. Somewhere in the long history of bad relationships, torturous work assignments and a host of interstate moves, I got scared. I stopped talking to people, stopped telling them about myself, and stopped wanting them to know me. I’m divorced, I’m fat, I’m a single mother…I’m all sorts of things that put a (-) sign in front of my name, or worse, a big, FAT zero. Once I passed the place where I could no longer say, ‘oh I could stand to lose a few’ and had to admit, ‘I’m overweight’, it all changed. I didn’t want people to get to know me, and I couldn’t bear the idea of investing in anything worthwhile. I didn’t have the courage to develop real friendships, and so faux friends sprung up all around me. I had a whole garden full of people who were okay to hang out with the fat girl because she never asked for anything, gave everything away and never stopped to consider that this was a self-destructive maneuver all on its own.

I don’t feel that way now, and a number of those faux folks have gone. Not all, but shedding takes some time, and eventually I imagine that I’ll be rid of all that excess baggage. In the mean time, I’m no longer afraid to reach out to people, no longer fearful of how they’ll judge me once they meet me. They might still dislike me, or try to take advantage of me; those people are everywhere. But I’m better equipped to spot the Takers now, and I’m better positioned to attract the Givers and the real people who want nothing from me but me, and who will give nothing but themselves. There’s nothing scary about that.

Angry

This ties pretty closely to the Fear Factor. I spent so many years being angry: mostly at myself, but also at my partners, my situation, and sometimes, at life as a whole. I couldn’t catch a break, I couldn’t get out of my contracting rut, I couldn’t find someone to love me who wasn’t broken in some capacity, and I couldn’t stop yelling about it. Sometimes it worries me how much of my life I hacked off by spurting adrenaline into my heart over things that shouldn’t have mattered, but that did, in the small and seething space I occupied for all those years.

Now, I have a great job that is both rewarding and challenging. I have the man of my dreams-literally, and I am blessed with the most wonderful child in the whole of Human History. I have a pretty little home, a houseful of happy cats and a wardrobe that, while still plain and a little frumpy, hints at the happiness that held the debit card to purchase it. I still get stressed, and I still yell too much—ask Howard. I may always be high strung and prone to overreaction. But I’m hopeful that it’ll dissipate, just as my fear and my girth did, and that some day, I’ll be one of those folks who walks around talking in aphorisms and actually meaning them. Why rage? It gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you anywhere. It’s a goal, and maybe now, it’s achievable.

Gray

The women in my family live for ages. All my great aunts lived well into their 90s, and my Aunt Jane lasted 109 years. They all worked their gardens until the end, showed up at family reunions giving each other the stink eye and vying for the best apple pie in the bunch and fried their chicken one piece at a time, with recipes to be guarded with white gloves covering (dainty) iron fists. They were grand dames, and they were good at being grand dames because they had looked like spritely crones for most of their lives. My mother started graying at 21; my grandmother at 18. When I went until I was 30 before I produced my first white crown ornament, the village wise woman went to her tent to consult the family tree. Could this be a Davis woman? Where is her snow?

I spent 12 years going back and forth between henna and semi-permanent color, never fully committing to covering my gray, and yet never really feeling I could let it grow out. I didn’t have much for a long while, just a few strays under my bangs. When I turned 40, I got some more, but most of it was still right on top of my head. Last year, in a fit of “I yam what I yam”, I let the rinse fade and tried out the Me & My Gray-bies ‘do at home and office. Most folks at work either politely ignored my Crone Goes Wild bouffant or noted that ‘I couldn’t do it, but it looks great on you.’

I wasn’t sure whether I liked it, and then, one night I was browsing the Natural Instincts at the grocer and Howard asked, “What are you doing?” When I told him I was thinking of covering my gray with something Warm and Golden Brown, he made some snipe about pancakes and syrup and then sighed. “Don’t color your hair. Or do,” he hedged, always the diplomat. “Do what makes you happy. But I like your gray. I think it’s sexy.”

Gray it is!

I kept it white, and it started to curl, all on its own. I’ve had poker-straight hair my whole life, and so when the curlicues appeared, I decided that maybe gray hair was for me. It was like Samson-my curl was tied up in my dye-less hair. If I colored it, I’d have to go back to straight and icky.

About a month ago, on a whim, I picked up a box of 5 Minutes to Lying or some such color that covers gray but only lasts a week or two. Curious if I would like my hair in an all-brown motif or spend the entire night under the shower head to wash it out, I brought it up gently to Howard. He seemed agreeable, though he was quick to caveat that he really liked the gray. “Don’t do it for me.” But the wedding loomed, I had plenty of time to wash it out if I hated it, and anyway, I just wasn’t sure if I wanted Granny Wozen in the pictures next to her husband, Howard. So off to the shower I went.

I didn’t like it at first. Though it appeared that I would get to keep my curls, the all-over color looked boring to me-no action up front, and no interest. I frowned and fussed in the mirror, checking to see if a stray strand or streak had made it through the wash. Nope. I did look younger, and it wasn’t awful-just really, really different. I took my head downstairs to show my men.

DS noticed it at once. “Hey mommy, what happened to your head?” What indeed? I explained what I’d done, and in the process, Howard turned around and took in a good look. “Wow,” he said. “I mean, I loved the gray but…Wow.”

Okay then. If gray is sexy and brunette is better, I’m a-covering up the old gray mare. After all, she ain’t what she used to be. And thank goodness for that.

A the O(ld but not Gray)