I love oatmeal. It speaks to childhood and grandparents and all manner of remembering. I had oatmeal this very morning for breakfast. It’s a happy start to my day. This wasn’t so much a bowl of oatmeal; the method of cooking differed slightly. Instead of boiling it on the stove, it was baked in the oven in a shape roughly resembling what you might call a cookie. I didn’t exactly need a spoon to eat this version of porridge, but I did have milk with it. It had oatmeal and eggs and chocolate chips, a bit of flour and sugar. Okay, I had chocolate chip oatmeal cookies for breakfast, but it contained many of the same ingredients. The difference is merely semantics. If I was part of a large study group and was asked to raise my hand if I had a hearty breakfast, I would definitely raise my hand. I might even wave my arm over my head like I did in elementary school, calling out oh oh, as if that ever helped anyone get noticed. To be honest, I very seldom raised my hand in class, but my rating of my breakfast this morning is top notch, or just a shade below, the difference hardly worth noting.
I admire those who follow a strict diet, who ensure they are getting healthy calories rather than empty versions. I’ve read that if we restrict sugar from our diet we can fend off a good many diseases. I applaud that research, I do. But I wasn’t blessed with the particular combination of genes that ensured my self-discipline encompassed diet and all things healthy. Self-discipline really is another form of being stubborn and I am brimming with many other forms of stubbornness, so it should balance out. I make great plans to follow a healthy regime when I go to bed at night , but before noon the next day, things have gone somewhere else in a handbasket. And now that I am at the age I am, is there really any point? If I have kale for lunch will I leap tall buildings in a single bound? I think not.
Aging feels a bit like I’m playing the starring role in an episode of Mission Impossible; the old television version, not the Tom Cruise version. I can hear the voice in my head: Your mission, Jim, or Wendi in my case, should you choose to accept it … translates to all manner of danger where aging is concerned. It seems I crawl into bed with a stiff knee on my left leg and wake-up with a sprained ankle on my right, as if I was playing a rough game of rugby while I slept. Well, Mr. Phelps and anyone else listening, I choose not to accept this mission of aging if I have to eat sensibly. I already feel like I’m living in the Twilight Zone and Rod Serling is pointing out that I can remember Marcy’s mother had a green refrigerator whose freezer opened with a foot pedal when we were fourteen, but I can’t remember what day of the week it is. I don’t think any amount of kale in my diet will correct that bit of madness.
So, for now, I will practice moderation. I will eat only three cookies for breakfast when the urge moves me, instead of eleven cookies. That’s a 70% reduction, praise-worthy for sure. And maybe I’ll run to the mailbox instead of walking. Although, come to think of it, that may border on the ludicrous.
