The World According to Chuck

Where we ask the question: Why do people park on my lawn?

They do, too. In fact, a year or so ago a friend gave me a ride home from a meeting and I invited him to come in for a bit. As I tried to direct him into a proper parking location, he decided to park his car in the middle of my lawn. Seriously. Right in the middle of the lawn.

And this guy lives in Bellevue, where (I believe) parking on a lawn will get you the death penalty.

Most of the people who do it are Julie’s students, and to be fair they only park a little bit on the lawn. But they do, and even though I don’t lose any sleep over it I wonder. In my mind, it’s as if I were to come over to your house and nonchalantly pee on the pool table. It’s not right.

Soda! Friday, by the way, refers to the message I found on the dry erase board today, where John likes to leave requests. Since he sometimes wanders during the night, he kindly leaves us notes, often with emphasis, listing his demands, usually erasing any information previously on the board, including phone numbers and important federal tax information.

So today it was Soda!, although he just means flavored carbonated water, which I managed to switch him to this fall. I don’t mind buying it for him, since it has no sugar (or calories), just bubbles, but it was a little disconcerting to get up from a nap and see it screaming! at me.

I took a nap because I was up to the wee hours, earning money, and so was a little deprived! in the sleep department. That, or else the short days and dark clouds are sending me under the covers. It can happen to people.

With 10 hours of daylight at most, at least one of my daily walks is in the dark, a lesson in caution and sometimes an exploration of ditches that maybe weren’t there the day before, hard to say. I should probably wear some of that orange reflective tape, but I have some sort of genetic aversion to looking like a dork, so I just stay on my toes.

Speaking of walks, and their raison d’être: There’s been some discussion in the comments (and in e-mail and, I’m guessing, my imagination) about what exactly I’m doing with all this exercising and scale gazing. So let me clear that up.

I don’t know.

I mean, I’m on an adventure, people. Sometimes there are not words.

Particularly this sometime. It’s hard on me, actually. I mean, if I’m a writer, and I can’t put into words what I’m thinking and feeling, do I really exist? Do I matter? Can I eat pizza again?

Most of this has to do with the fact that it’s such a mundane subject. Yeah, another middle-aged guy attempting to regain his thin thighs and dusting off his Bee Gees albums, annoying 30-something women and buying Viagra and Axe by the case.

And part of the problem is I write very thin. It’s sort of a gift. The truth is, I got really, really fat. It’s not inconceivable (inconceivable!) even that I could have moved into the morbidly obese category in a few years, given the right circumstances and enough mozzarella cheese.

I don’t think so, but it was conceivable. Really, really fat. There was a picture taken of me at a party in late July that I saw recently. I’ll post that when I’m really thin, or posthumously, whatever comes first. Really, really fat.

But there’s more, and that’s what I can’t find the words for. I’m not doing this for vanity, health or comfort, although those all apply to some degree. It’s something else. It’s…something else. See what I mean?

I appreciate the good wishes, though. Every pound off is another year of glorious life (I made that statistic up, but I really like it), and I’m enjoying walking around the house in my underwear again. Particularly if “You Should Be Dancing” is on. And I’ll write about what’s going on one of these days.

At the moment, though, dry erase board says “Mac and Cheese!” I believe this is a sign, and I believe in signs, and I believe in cheese, which is sort of the best I can do at the moment. Also, I have to check the lawn and maybe let the air out of some tires, depends.