The Committee on Food

I am currently the heaviest I’ve ever been, so I can’t honestly say that what I’m about to tell you is any kind of a sure cure for unwanted weight gain. What it is, I hope, is some insight into the complicated thinking we do about eating and its consequences. I am also not a young man, so it has taken me a while to get this heavy, and to think these thoughts, and to find the time to think them through and write them down.

Whenever I am deciding to have something to eat there is inevitably a complicated discussion about it going on in my head. I refer to the various elements of that discussion, “voices” if you prefer, as the “Committee on Food.” I find that I have five distinct considerations in mind when I’m deciding to eat, and they don’t always pop up in the same order. For convenience sake, I’ll assign an order here, but your experience may be much different.

First, can I afford it? Free food jumps in value here. Whether “free food tastes the best” is true or not, sometimes perfectly good food options are simply out of my price range. That can be literal, as in I only have cash, and very little of that. Or emotional, as I’m not willing to pay fifty dollars for a steak at a restaurant when I can grill one at home for much less myself. The cheapskate in me won’t let me “waste” that much money, though I’ve certainly spent a lot of money on sushi from time to time.

 Second, can I make it myself? Regardless of price, some foods are best prepared by experts [see sushi above] and I have a hard time resisting expertly made treats. The gourmet in me wants to eat the especially yummy, can’t-get-it-at-home, foods. I have never, ever, been seriously tempted by someone else’s version of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. That treat I do best at home. Come over sometime and I’ll prove it.

Third, am I hungry? I can eat when I’m not hungry, and sometimes we eat to be polite, or because it’s been the right number of hours since the last meal, or because trying to function with low blood sugar is a bad idea. But am I actually hungry? When you’re actually quite hungry almost any food seems like a good idea.

Fourth, is it “bad” food? Some foods will always be a bad idea, no matter who you are or how your digestive system works. I won’t name names here, but I can say that there’s a specific breakfast cereal that I used to love as a kid that was not good for the quality of the domestic atmosphere in the hours following. It doesn’t matter if other people are eating it, or if it’s free, or if I’m starving. For me at least, it’s bad food, and so no longer counts as food at all.

Fifth, is being cranky worse than eating too much, or putting on weight? Ideally, our individual moods and happiness are not dependent on overeating, but the process of under-eating often leads to crankiness and damage to the domestic tranquility. If eating something will lighten my mood, maybe that’s the greater good. It doesn’t have to be a whole chocolate cake, mind, but a timely snack might easily save a marriage. And so on.

Lots of reasons to eat something, or to not eat something. I hate the idea of needing to buy new larger clothes [see cheapskate above]. I also prefer moving more easily and getting approval from my doctor. And in all of these things I suspect I’m a lot like other people. The problem for me is that when the discussion in my head is going on about this food or that food, or is it time to eat again, I fundamentally enjoy food. The voices that say “NO,” just speak too quietly, or get drowned out by all the other voices approving the opportunity. And realistically, our bodies need/want food.

So, what can I do? I have found it helps to just wave off certain foods, even if they’re not officially “bad.” No ice cream in the house, or fried chicken, or chips. Some restaurants get the same treatment. I hardly ever eat fast food, and then only because I’m on the road and it’s what I can find. We also have fabulous restaurants in my hometown, so lots of perfectly normal places never even get considered. No point in considering them, I know I can do better.

I can also exaggerate what things are “too expensive.” When I’m attentive to prices at the grocery store, it’s easy to see how eating out costs more. I don’t begrudge the restaurants the money, but I can often appeal to my inner thriftiness to at least postpone the pleasure until some other day. And don’t get me wrong, good food is full of pleasure. Nutrients, and necessity, and health, but mostly pleasure. And that will always make it harder for the committee to tell me not to eat it.

I should say too that food includes drinks, especially boozy drinks with lots of calories. I remember a warning poster once that showed the equivalence between certain drinks and hot fudge sundaes. Like many people, a beer now and then is quite easy to agree to, but hot fudge sundaes seem like a pure surrender to weight gain. Looking at the equivalence chart, I’m afraid my thought was not that I should avoid both booze and hot fudge sundaes, but rather that I should substitute an ice cream treat for a casual beer more often.

Whether the choices you make are steak, sushi, beer, or ice cream, it seems that the main challenge is to be clear-eyed and intentional. Our choices have consequences, and pleasures, and the worst thing we can do is be absent-minded or thoughtless about the process.