Middle Aged Musings

They Don’t Get It. By Teresa Pesce

“There is always a healthful choice,” chirped the diet diva. She was telling weight-loss hopefuls how to cope with a social world filled with tempting food. Her idea was that you could always go to the party and have a great time! Just pass by all the delicious hors d’oeuvres and go straight to the raw broccoli. Or attend the art center event catered by local restaurants with a dizzying array of delights, and go straight to the raw broccoli.

“If your hostess serves dessert, give it a pass!” Give it a pass? Why does one go out to socialize if not to share great food, drink and conversation? If it’s cut back to conversation, one can stay home and visit chat rooms. I’m saying, where is the FUN if all the fun food is deleted from your life?

One doctor, when he learned I was going to a special steakhouse for dinner and was concerned over not being able to partake of the famous menu, frowned and said irritably, “You can eat as much as you want! Just ask for fresh fruit, and eat watermelon until you’re full!” This man was built like a stork and would not recognize a food craving if it held him up by gunpoint and demanded satisfaction.

Watermelon? In a steakhouse? With grilled steaks seared to perfection, spicy Texas beans and crisp, deep-fried potato strips plunged into fresh-chopped salsa? Oh sure. That’ll do it. What planet do these people come from? They are the Spocks of the eating world. They eat by nutritional factors and calorie counts, from sustenance needs and not from responding to seductive fragrances and delicious flavors.

Of course there is always a healthful choice! But sometimes, who cares?! If there isn’t a social life beyond broccoli, I am going to become a recluse. It isn’t that these well-meaning Spockians are wrong, it’s just that they dispense this advice a bit too glibly. It is HUGE to ignore delicious food.

So if you are strong enough to munch carrots and sip water at social events, allow me to bestow a wreath of highest praise upon your noble brow and rise to begin the standing ovation. If you add some brie and crackers and a small assortment of hor d'oeuvres, allow me to say that the world will not end. If you collapse completely and add chocolate truffles beside a slice of raspberry-drizzled cheesecake, allow me to say I understand. You be understanding, too. There will be a next time when you navigate the calorie-laden waters of your social life more skillfully. But never let the Spockians make you feel bad by making it all seem easy. It isn’t. And Yoda was wrong. There IS a try, for every success is a completion of a try.

#health