I must be tired today to write such a corny headline, but I just had to make some kind of super hero reference because of this photograph, which looks for all the world like a frame from a new science fiction movie. Don’t I look like I’m forming some sort of plasma energy bolt? Or maybe unlocking a warp in the space-time continuum through which I can transport to another dimension?
Or maybe I just look like a guy taking a picture of himself in the mirror at Men’s Warehouse as he’s being fitted for a tux. By the way, you are likely to see plenty of slightly off-center photos for awhile, because the screen on my digital camera has gone blank. My wife has this silly theory that the screen got damaged because I always carry the camera in my pocket along with my cell phone, my 24 keys, and the $3 in change which I almost always have on hand. It is true that the camera, which is six months old, is a little bit battered and bruised- in fact, it looks like I’ve subjected it to one of the tests in those classic John Cameron Swayze Timex Watch commercials- the ones where a watch is attached to the bow of a speedboat and which is found to still be ticking after the boat has sped around the lake. Except in this case, it looks like I tied my camera to some railroad tracks and allowed three or four locomotives to roll over it. Anyway, wherever the blame lies – and really, what do we gain by assigning blame anyway?!?! – the camera is still capable of taking pictures. . . I just can’t see for myself what the photo looks like until I’m back and at my computer. It seems like a monstrous inconvenience until you realize that this is the way it used to be for all of us.
Anyway, back to our topic- such as it is. . . Yesterday I finally got myself to MW Tux – the tuxedo rental place right down the road from us – and it wasn’t just for kicks. I was being fitted for a tux because on July 11th – less than a month from now – I will be a groomsman in Trevor Parker’s wedding. And it sounds incredibly shallow to say this, but this is the reason why I’ve been on such a weight loss campaign – this is why I’ve practically sworn off Big Macs and Whoppers in favor of turkey subs – why my newest snack favorite is a bag of microwavable mixed vegetables – and why, most amazing of all, I have been to Razor Sharp gym four times this week – and not to drop off Racine Symphony brochures. I have been there to work up a sweat. . . and for what? I have to admit that my primary motivation in the beginning was so I could stand up there with Trevor’s other groomsmen and not have people in the congregation asking each other “I wonder who that obese older gentlemen is? Could that be one of Trevor’s grandfathers? How sweet that Trevor would ask him to be a groomsman.” I am under no illusions that losing some weight will allow me to blend in with my fellow groomsmen- a young and strapping crowd, to say the least. (Just my luck – the one other groomsman who is also a bit older than the groom was one of Trevor’s football coaches at Carthage and looks like he could still be playing.) So we’re still going to look like Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Matt Damon, George Clooney, and Don Rickles. . . except now, thanks to my weight loss, you can maybe swap out Don Rickles and insert – I don’t know, Harvey Korman? (God rest his soul.) It will still look odd- and for all I know, it will also feel odd – but it will also be amazing and wonderful to stand up at someone’s wedding for only the second time in my whole life (The other was for Polly and Mark’s wedding) especially for two people I love as much as I love Trevor and Megan.
So why didn’t I feel motivated to lose so much as a single pound before my 25th college reunion back in the fall? I haven’t a clue. Looking back, I realize that the vast majority of my classmates looked really wonderful – almost as though time had stood still. But ultimately that didn’t matter to me as much as just seeing everyone, no matter what their waistline or hairline happened to be. And somehow my own waistline didn’t matter to me at the time either.
But for this event it does matter, and I still haven’t figured out why. (If it’s simple vanity, why didn’t that kick in before my reunion?) All I know is, from the moment in early January when Trevor asked me to be a groomsman, I have been on a mission. And if the short term goal is to look halfway presentable for the wedding itself, maybe the long term goal can be that I’ll still be around to help Trevor and Megan celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary – or my own 50th. For that, I am more than willing to sweat instead of sit and eat turkey subs instead of t-bone steaks.