Ftrain, by Paul Ford

Note via email, from H--:

I wonder about that woman and "lifestyle changes." We both know people who've made them. Whether it's smoking, or diet, or drugs, or exercising, or any number of areas. They happen. People shift around in them. I don't think they look the same over a long period of time, but the suggestion that "relapse" is an end state and not part of the lifestyle change itself does not hold up in my experience or those I've seen.

True; there are no actual cycles in life, corporate presentations aside. Everything is moving forward in time. The appearance of a circle, of a life-cycle, is actually a sinusoidal curve, as is shown by this admirable public-domain image from Wikimedia Commons of a "real sinusoid on a timebase, formed by a linear increment of complex argument in time":

That circle is as perfect as a computer can make it; the actual cycles under discussion wobble as the clock pulls them along. They enlarge and contract and change direction. The curve is affected, obviously. It's not relapse; it's something new.

It's not the flesh that bothers me, or lifestyle that I want to change; I don't have a lifestyle. This is about humility, about how much I hate being forced to kneel before desire-- not hunger or need, but desire. And the even greater humiliation of admitting that. Adulthood is when opportunity starts driving in the other direction.

Hunger should be fed promptly, but desires should be considered--there needs to be a moat around the castle, a five-second waiting period. For very long for me it was like a bad silent-film cut. One minute the cake is in the frame; then a flash, and the fat man is rubbing his stomach and smiling and the thin man is looking at the tablecloth where the cake used to be. Intertitle card:

The sneaking. The ice cream bars between getting off the train and my front door. As I wandered home in the dark with a giant paw crammed into a bag of Andy Capp Hot Fries, seeking the dark like a cat, hiding from the spotlights on the fat-seeking helicopters. Let's not pretend that's over. My wife is away for the weekend. Already I find myself planning on a pint of ice cream.

When I look at photos of those nice round FA feminist ladies I find myself thinking that they're betties, and that I'd take them into the slappery for a whistle. I love, always loved, sturdy brook-no-shitters. Long hair, shorn hair, polo shirt, torn dresses, F-cups, fury. If someone made a pornographic magazine that showed a chubby woman in sports bra and cargo pants punching a riot cop and the cover line was "DWORKIN OUT YOUR FEELINGS!!!" I'd buy at least one copy (I'd buy a subscription). But that doesn't mean I always agree.

When I met my wife she wore navy-colored coveralls, rhinestone-decorated, that she used for welding.

There is a recipe from the Middle Ages that guarantees against relapsing into old habits. You crush up two beetles (variety not identified) and mix them with 1/2 c. of grade-A, thick, white, yeast-enriched women's discharge. Mix that into the morning porridge for seven days straight, skip the small beers, and you are good to go for eternity doing whatever you want to be doing now.