Like most kids, I hated trips to the clothing store. Two hours deprived of whiffle ball, clubhouses, and Rock’em Sock’em Robots (the blue guy had a glass jaw, one jab and his melon popped up) was bad enough, but the commandeered time instead spent stuffing myself into ridiculous wool “slacks,” striped pullovers seemingly designed to emphasize boy boobs, and shiny black shoes you would nowadays reserve for funerals, rose to the level of tragedy. The worst part, though, was when the sales clerk, his yellow tape-measure having completed its merciless work, would clear his throat, cast his gaze regretfully downward, and solemnly intone those dreaded words-the ones that usually moistened my nine-year-old eyes: “I think he’ll need a husky.”
And the dude was not talking about an Alaskan sled dog. Nope, in this context “husky” referred to a blunt, sadistically descriptive size designation applied to adult-styled kid’s clothes that fit my freakishly fat (pc terms like “thick” were a full 50 years from inception) 140 lbs. Sort of. While the expandable waist well conformed to my Frito inspired belly, the legs, lifted straight from a 1940’s gangster movie-they would not have been out of place on an occupant bellowing “You’ll never take me alive coppers!”-billowed around in a decidedly non-60’s manner.
It was the hip, cheesy time of Adam West, and The Monkees, and short, skinny pant legs that rode halfway up the calf-and my 5th grade classmates were having zero of my Humphrey Bogart britches. One girl, Laura (lucky for her I don’t recall her last name), was kind enough to even compose a song : 🎵🎵 Wiggle..waggle..wiggle go Mark Patterson’s pants! The melody sounded somewhat like that WW 2 classic “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” only catchier. Catchy enough to rise higher, for sure, on the 36th street grammar school hit parade (Beaver Falls, if you’re curious) than its nationally recognized soundalike. Too bad for me that my tormentor had talent-which resulted in a six-block singalong on the way home every day as a lot of the class, my friends included, sang loud backup to Laura’s full-throated ode to my billowing pants. Windy days made it worse. Way worse.
Nonetheless, my love affair with eating never waned. Better shamed than unsatiated. And you’d better believe that I did me some satiating. Chips (the Wise Barbecue variety are still produced to this day because of my slavish patronage), Ice cream (veritable avalanches of butterscotch AND pineapple sauce turned every bowl into some elaborate sundae that Dairy Queen could only dream of), huge hunks of Velveeta cheese, and, of course, all manner of straight-up candy turned every day into a gluttonous festival of food. Believe me, if the “G” word does qualify as sin, they reserved my space in the seventh circle well before I hit puberty.
Nor did I fall short of caloric quotas at mealtime. I recall once consuming eight (8..ocho..7+1) pork chops slathered in some sort of cherry sauce that my mom seemed proud of. Until her expression of pride turned to one of sheer horror at the sight of a slashing fork I wielded like Zorro. “That there is a MEAT boy,” my dad approvingly informed her, keenly oblivious to the heart-clogging properties of the feast I was shoveling down. (Sometimes even now after a good belch I can catch a taste of those cherries.)
Would you believe I’m a picky eater? Even birdlike, on frequent occasion-an ancient Tetradactyl, that is. Seriously, though, certain foods DO repulse me. All the better to keep my poundage under 400 (I topped out 20 years ago at a wiry 382, down now to a svelte 295). No white bread. Not after stuffing a slice of morning toast into my tight, squirmy pocket and proceeding out to play on a day that saw noon temps soar close to 90. The liquified sludge I retrieved would forever force Nickels, and Schwebel’s to do without my business. And condiments? Just the thought of mayo, relish, mustard (especially yellow), or relish can set me praying to the porcelain God. Do not LAYER food ON my food. Just let me at it. Are you listening, Primanti Bros?
Getting back to the puberty thing. Tipping the scales in ’71 like Haystacks Calhoun (remember “Studio Wrestling” with Bill Cardille?) tended to limit your dating pool. I can’t, for the life of me, recall a single cheerleader enamored of bouncing bellies. My first GF, in fact, wore a poncho-for real-and hardly in tribute to Spaghetti Westerns (well, except for the pasta part). Tammie was a big girl, for sure, a type for which I harbored no (particular) fetish, it’s just that our social calendars seemed to match up…free on every occasion.
Nowadays, big ole’ boys proudly waddle with the best-looking girls- a cultural change I’m at a loss to explain. Has “personality” actually entered the equation? If so, I sure missed THAT boat by, oh, about 40 years. Except for then lacking confidence, conversational skills, kindness, consideration, and, of course, an even remotely pleasing countenance (that there was a biggie), wow, would I have done well with the ladies!
As society expands its collective waistline-one in four adult Americans classify as obese-accommodations have been made to clothe the (jiggling) masses. As opposed to once jamming my bulk into “extra-large” duds that constricted my breath and outlined every flab roll, I can now buy in sizes that don’t demystify my dimensions. (4x seems to sell out fastest, as, presumably, “tons” of dudes exactly my size now shake and rattle our planet.)
Technically, I’m classified as “morbidly” obese. The latter part I get. But “morbid” makes me sound like a walking (oops, lumbering) horror movie. And implies stuff like “unhealthy-interest” in cadavers-one of which, medical science assures, I’ll soon become.
Somehow, I’ve managed to avoid that fate. But not by dieting. That’s never worked, at least for long, for me. Mediterranean? Schmediterranean. Oh, I try to cut back, but after a few days of fantasizing about food like it’s a long-lost love, I’m hitting the fridge at 3 am. Besides, it’s not the TYPE, but rather the AMOUNT of grub I fork-lift into my face that’s a problem. You can get fat on salads, believe me. Think Market District shut down their lettuce bar as a casualty of Covid? Not if they caught moi on tape making it rain dried cranberries (not cheap) into a family size container of diced chicken and sliced ham over a stingy bed of greenery employed only to camouflage the whole obscenity as a “salad.”
Eating habits you can “live” with. Now, THAT’S the ticket, I tell ya. And I can SURE live on sugary cereals, cheese curls, cheeseBURGERS, dinner out 3x a week (always double fries for my two allotted sides), and the more than occasional trip to that little piece of heaven otherwise known as Kretchmar’s Bakery in beaver. Still the same after all these years-and still wearing my big pants. Take THAT Laura!!
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