The Skinny Gene/More Loss

Some people find themselves genetically predisposed to be big. This was not the case for me; I was the outlier. I come from a family of pretty trim, quasi-athletic East Africans, which means back in my obese days, my size was a bit of an eyebrow-raiser. Now Ugandans, not particularly inclined towards subtlety, would love to pass the time positing explanations for my “abnormality,” not all too complex in nature: “WOW: you love American burgers? You’ve become a big baga! Hahaha!” …um… noooooo… rude. So it seemed aside from my size inhibiting a true claim to the family name… my very nationality was on the run. In Uganda it feels like: to be obese is to be American; to be fat is to be rich; to be slim is to be sick (“sick” mean you have HIV/AIDs). So, it’s a tricky look. Like most people, places, cultures, your body is a canvas, the larger your canvas, the more you’re apparently trying to say, and the more folks seem to want to read it, read into it, read onto it.

Sure, sometimes there’s a story to read onto a larger than average body, and sometimes it’s really not that deep at all. I have several friends who have gone through bouts of depression or on the flip side the complete euphoria of coupledom or something, and consequently expressed their bliss or sorrow through weight gain or weight loss. I watched my first episode of the U.K T.V show Supersize Vs Superskinny, and an anorexic girl spoke about growing up in a single-parent household frustrated and miserable and equating eating food with rewarding positive feelings. It seemed a little bizarre and unfortunate that each day she felt she’d only earned half a piece of toast and some baked beans. In any case, it was clear she was unhappy, and a little weird, and her body was a canvas, with a Salvador Dali on it rather than a Monet or anything.

But the thing is, sometimes eating, such an ordinary activity, seems like the most ridiculous thing to do during abnormal times. Or sometimes it feels like precisely all that can be done.

If my body is my canvas, and if I am emotionally distraught, then food is my paint, a fork my paintbrush, and I find myself deciding between minimalist expression, or one of those hectic and questionable pieces of “art.” At least, that would have been the case on the plane today, until I realized, I was my own audience and nobody was studying me. And with nothing but time, over 500 movies, one book and my laptop, for the 15-hour flight from San Francisco to Dubai, the 13-hour layover I’m currently in the midst of, and the 8-hour journey to Uganda tomorrow, I figured I might as well reflect.

My father died yesterday. Dad had been a force: strong (I would cling to his leg like a Kuala bear as a child, and he would give me “lifts” around the house); athletic (I watch him workout at Parklands sports club in Nairobi four to five times a week); health-conscious (I can’t remember when I discovered that brown rice also came in white). His body fought and survived more health issues than most of the bodies I know. The past seven years had been hard for him as he slowly shift-shaped from a pinnacle of strength to the epitome of frailty. Now on my journey back home, to eat or not to eat seems like the stupidest question. My tears, my sadness, is that not enough, or must I wear my grief like a supersized or superskinny? The eating, denying, indulging, feels a little too much like an easy outlet to express my sadness. So, I'll try my best to find another way.