Authors: Deborah Blumenthal
Fat Chance (22 page)
“The holidays,” my mother says, shaking her head. “It's always such a crazy time.”
“We were never home, I was raised in the bakery. All our birthday cakes. Remember Danny, the college kid who helped on weekends? I had such a crush on him. And the time I got mad at Kelly and poured flour over her head? I remember how it landed on her eyelashes. She looked like a snow angel. Daddy wanted to kill me.”
“You were a handful.”
“That place was like the ying and yang of who I am. I wish I could think of a way to save that place.”
“It's been forty years,” she says, holding out her hands in
resignation. “It's over. I can't work that way anymore. It takes too much energy.”
“Do you feel terrible, Ma? I mean, it was your
whole life.
”
“There's a time when you have to let go.”
“I was never good at that.” There's a stinging in my eyes. I look at the pale wrinkled skin on her face, the mottled skin on her hands and the slight tremor now. “First Daddy, and now this. I don't want to lose that⦠It'sâ¦it's everything.” My hands shoot up to my mouth.
“You grow up, Maggie. Things change.”
“Were you happy there?” I ask finally.
“Happy?” She contemplates that like it's a new concept. “We worked around the clock, there was no other life.” She reaches for a plate and rinses it off before putting it into the dishwasher. “I don't think I ever asked myself if I was happy. Happy? What does that mean? We built up a good business. We had more than our parents ever did.” She lets her voice trail off. “But we didn't live in the stars, Maggie. There'sâ¦there's no point to it. You have to just live.”
“Just live? I'm not sure I know what that means. I want the best kind of life that I can make for myself. I'm right to expect that, aren't I?”
“Wellâ¦as long as it doesn't blind you, Maggie, and get in the way of you being happy with everything around you, everything that you have.”
I stare out the window, watching plumes of golden light through the gnarled branches of the trees. It was a sight that I had seen so many times before, but now, for the first time, it holds such intense, fleeting beauty that it's almost too painful to look at.
“Yes, you're right,” I whisper, “so right.” I put my arms around my mother and feel the comfort of her soft, warm skin. “I'm sorry for always giving you such a hard time with
everything⦠I miss you. I miss this house and everything here. I'm so lucky to have thisâ¦and to have you. I'm sorry that I take things for granted, Maâ¦.”
“I'm glad you came to visit,” my mother says, kissing me on the cheek. “Remember what your grandmother used to say?”
I look at her and smile. “Seeing you makes me rich.” I always loved that.
“Go back now before the subways get crowded,” she says, looking at me with a concerned expression. I pick up my bag and walk toward the door. I open it, and kiss her one last time. My mother starts to close the door, and then opens it up again.
“So, when are you finally going to bring someone here for me to meet?”
T
he thick down comforter envelops me like a feathery cocoon. I love down blankets. There's something irresistibly opulent about surrounding yourself with a billowy pillow of feathers. After an hour on the NordicTrack, I've been reading in bed with CNN on the TV, muted, like electronic wall-paper. No matter what I do, at this moment in time my body resists fatigue. I've already taken a hot bath and sprinkled lavender oil on my pillow. It's supposed to relax you, induce sleep. Maybe I should move on to chloroform.
Truth is, even after my visit to see my mother, I still need to talk. But Tex? Would he still be so pissed at me? Would he care anymore, particularly at a time like this? I wish I knew if he was close to his mother. While women needed to talk out their feelings, men usually clammed up. They went drinking with their buddies, and vented their thwarted emotions by talking loudly about sports, cars or girls. Their shrink was Dr. Bud.
I put my hand on the phone and then hesitate. I try to imagine what I might be interrupting. He's from a small desert town near Odessa, surrounded by miles of dusty roads heading nowhere. His father died years before, so this was the end of the parental buffer that keeps death a generation away. Being around three married sisters didn't necessarily help. In fact, all that noise could make you feel more alone, especially if you were single. Of course he wouldn't be for long. I dial the number, and wait as it rings.
“Hello.” Not Tex. Whoever he was had a thick drawl. I hear talking in the background. At least I didn't wake the whole house.
“I'm sorry to disturb you, but I'm trying to reach Tex. I'm a friend of his from New York.”
“Hang on there, young lady.” I hear a door open and the voice yell, “T E H X.” A few moments later, he picks up.
“I'm so sorry, Tex.”
There's a silence on the other end for a long minute. “Thanks.”
“How long you staying?”
“Not sure.”
“Tex. I'm so sorryâ¦about your motherâ¦and everythingâ¦I miss youâ”
“It's okay, Maggie, Iâ”
“No, no, it's not. I know this is a bad time for you and I don't want to think that we're not even speakingâ”
“Sounds like we areâ”
“You know what I mean. I don't want there to be bad feelings between us anymore, I couldn't stand that. I just had so much anger in me for such a long timeâ¦.” I stop, not sure of what to say. I don't want to go off about me and my problems right now. I can hear him breathing. “I don't know what to say⦠I'mâ¦different now⦔
“So you're saying that you're finally sane?” I can hear a smile in his words.
“Not nearly.”
“Well, that's good⦠I couldn't stand a lobotomized Maggie O'Leary.”
“You're my
friend,
Tex. I love you, reallyâ¦. When are you coming back?”
“I don't know,” he says, sounding lost. “I'm seeing this place differently this time. The quietâ¦the desertâ¦all the space. The roads are so quiet you can drive blindfolded. I didn't know how badly Iâ¦I forgot what it was like not to have somebody yelling over my shoulder. And the snakes here are the real kind.”
“I wish I could see it,” I blurt out, surprising myself.
“Come on out.”
“Just like that.”
“Why not?”
“I just got back from Los Angelesâ¦. Iâ¦I don't know.”
“The movie star?”
“Yeah.”
“You really stuck on him?”
“I don't knowâ¦. nnnno.”
“Jesus, Maggie, you're even a sicker puppy than I thought.”
“Don't be mad at me.”
“What difference does that make?”
“You're my friend.”
“Is it over?”
“I don't know. Life's complicatedâ¦.” I slide down in bed and pull the cover over my head. We're like two kids now, hiding in our tent. “These things happen.”
He doesn't say anything.
“Tex, you still there?”
“He's not with you
now,
is he?” he says, in a hoarse whisper.
“He's in L.A.”
“He couldn't even pick himself up and fly back with you?”
I just hold the phone, listening to him breathe. Then the tears start, and I can't stop myself.
“Aw, Maggie, stop. C'mon, baby.”
I'm sobbing now. “I can't. I know I have a real talent for screwing up my life, Tex, but⦔ I stop to blow my nose. “But I didn't even have a life beforeâ¦and I was so messed up and just seething with angerâ”
“Maggie?”
“What?”
“Iâ¦I gotta go nowâ¦Jesus, Sharon's calling meâ¦the priest's hereâ¦I'll call you back, darlin'.”
“Texâwaitâ”
But he's gone. Slowly, I put the receiver back.
Â
It's 4:00 a.m., and I'm lying awake, haunted by thoughts of
Leaving Las Vegas,
a movie about despair, broken dreams and drinking yourself to death. It makes me think about how alcohol is just one addiction on the illusory path to fulfillment, and how food is simply another. Maybe Taylor, a movie star, is cut from the same cloth. A piece of chocolate cake in a human body. I get up and make coffeeâstrong, espressoâthen sit in front of the computer. Various combinations of those 26 keys of the alphabet inevitably help me get to the root of what I'm feeling.
Dear Taylor:
I owe you more than the scribbled note that I stuck on your refrigerator (under L.A. Lakers magnet) after I suddenly cleared
out. You really never had a chance to find out much about your fat tutor/houseguest/short-term bedmate, and probably (why not brag here?) the best cook, I'll venture, who will ever take over your kitchen. The crazy journalist who zigzagged back and forth from New York is a girl who has spent her life wishing on stars (no pun intended). As hard as I try to hide it, I'm easily seduced by fantasy, love stories, romance novelsâthe cheaper the better. Maybe to some degree that description fits every woman who's vulnerable and emotionally fragile. But I have to confess that I think it also has to do with being a woman who, for her entire life, has punished herself for being fat and unpopular, a woman who suffers from terminally low self-esteem. Clearly, I'm not aloneâexhibit A, my decent paycheck for the column.
When your life is perpetually darkened by sadness, disappointment and unpopularity, what do you do? Create a better world that you inhabit in your dreams, a world where roadblocks become opportunities. You become a Victoria's Secret model (with bureau drawers overflowing with lemon-and-lime-colored demibras and matching silk thongs. A world without discolored cotton briefs with full-coverage backs). Men with bodies and faces like firemenâlike yours, actuallyâare everywhere, willing to be seduced. But that fantasy world is actually a trap. Because if real people in this lesser world keep measuring reality against that fantasy, they're boomeranging their chances of ever becoming happy.
Now I know for sure that even men like you drop dirty socks on the bathroom floor, leave the toilet seat up and hair in the bathtub. They turn deaf in front of football games and belch after drinking beer. Like all mortal creatures, they have their limitations. I fell hard for you, or my fantasy of you, Taylor. But I know that we come from different worlds. In truth, I can't summon much interest in the day-to-day
world of making movies. My interest is in writing, and getting better at it, not necessarily being more popular. I would be crushed by the full-time scrutiny of the paparazzi. And, Taylor, if I had to contend with screaming fans swarming around you every time we walked out the door, I'd go postal.
That's my side of it, of course. As to how you'd stand me? You probably wouldn't be able to. My body image will probably never change appreciatively, and ultimately, I think that in your rarified world where everyone looks retouched, my wailings about my perpetual failure to live up would start to grate.
Also, at heart, since I'm the type who's attracted to less of a glossy life, what would you do with yourself while I was home researching columns? Go out partying. You realize our percentages for success then, right, gorgeous one?
Then, even though this is a sensitive area, there's the business of marriage and raising a family. I'm getting up there, Taylor, and don't take this personally, but I just couldn't imagine you as the guy who I would want to be the father of my kids. Although you're off the charts when it comes to the DNA for good looks, when it comes to the burden of parenting, where would you be? A back lot in the Philippines filming the next great World War II movie? How would you read the kids a storyâover your international cell phone? Am I starting to sound angry and cynical? You see how it's always there, just seething below the surface?
Any way I look at it, Taylor, I think my fantasy world with you would end the moment it began for real. Maybe, in fact, it did. (That second, full-price ticket to L.A. turned out to be cheap at the price.)
Have a wonderful life, Taylor, and I can't tell you how much it means to me to remember that
you
asked
me
to stay. Love, Maggie.
Â
I stare at the screen. “Thank you, Michael Dell, for the therapy machine.” I press Delete, and the screen goes blank.
At 6:00 a.m. the black sky is slowly fading to gray and then indigo. I climb back into bed and wake three hours later with the sun streaming through the window. I look out at the city sprawled before me. Inexplicably, I look forward to the rest of my life.
Obesity: A Disease or Symptom?
There's no denying it. Thirty-five percent of Americans are overweight, and twenty-seven percent of them are obese. But that said, researchers are coming to the conclusion that obesity means different things for different people, and simply losing weight doesn't turn a fat person into a normal one. While, undoubtedly, many overweight people have the typical risk factors associated with diseases such as high blood pressure, higher than normal blood sugar levels, and high cholesterol, many overweight people do not.
What's more, while it is commonly held that simply losing weight will make one healthier and live longer, studies have shown repeatedly those overweight people who managed to not only lose weight, but also keep it off hadâI know this is hard to believeâSUFFERED MORE FROM HEART DISEASE AND A HIGHER DEATH RATE THAN FAT PEOPLE WHO SIMPLY REMAINED FAT! The only question mark, researchers say, is whether the people who lost the weight did so by dieting, or simply lost the weight because they became ill. This is something that the studies don't reveal, and that's why
new recruits are being sought by the Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.
I had ignored the calls from the William Morris agent, but they didn't stop. When I picked up my own phone one afternoon, Slim Sharkey was on the other end. The name alone should have put me on alert. But his voice was so smooth that before I could think of a reason to say no, yes came out. He was attractive, I had seen his picture in
New York Magazine,
and he was famous for his high-end deals, so what the hell? The Samovar was hard to turn down, even if I was on a low-octane fitness plan.
Slim Sharkey wasn't his real name. According to the word in gossip circles, he was dubbed Sharkey by a Miramax executive following a lucrative book-movie deal he finagled with a reticent star. A name like Sharkey assumed a life of its own, and he quickly put Richard MillsteinâDickâout to pasture. As to Slim, well, he was, and it seemed to go well with Sharkey.
I spot him sipping mineral water with lime at a lipstick-red leather booth. When I walk in I'm immediately seduced by the opulent decor, styled after the famous Russian Tea Room. Deep red walls, gilded trim, red-patterned carpeting, and chandeliers ringed with gold Christmas balls. What better setting for talking about potential deals?
He's suited up in Armaniâa steel-blue T-shirt under a slate-gray suit. The second thing I notice is what my grandmother used to call “a nice head of hair.” Dark brown, longish, carefully layered, with highlights more subtle than my own, enlivening his tan. He stands and smiles warmly, extending a hand. “Slim Sharkey.” I almost laugh out loud and think, momentarily, of replying with “Fat Barracuda.”
The requisite banter takes nearly an hour. I show amaz
ing control, slowly enjoying my beet-red, hot borscht with slivers of veal and beef with horseradish dumplings. Casually, I bite into one of the caramelized bacon onion potato pirozhki. Divine. I want thirty more. But no, this will be my first and only course. No blini with caviar, crème fraîche and melted butter. No Chicken Kiev that oozes butter. But yes, I do have a peppery bloody Mary, and it helps melt away the tension. So do Sharkey's soft brown eyes that rarely leave mine. You don't stuff your face when eyes like his are penetratingâor trying toâyour psyche, or something.
He tells me how much he admires my work, and how I have become a role model for brash, honest reporting. How my take is fresh, insightful, inspiring, unique. Oh-la-la, this is tickling my ego. He's a master of the stroke job and I let him stroke on, entertained.
“I've been around the block, Maggie, and you offer readers a voice and a conscience like no one else on the health scene today.” He asks about my background, and I return the questions.
“How long have you been at William Morris? What kind of projects have you worked on?” He talks about his “other” life too, lest I should be left with the impression that all he does is make deals and doesn't have a sensitive side. He keeps a place in St. Maarten for scuba diving, “To get away from the Hamptons scene,” he says, and he likes to go up to the Cape.
“Do you know Truro? I hide out there to paint and go parasailing.”
