The World According to Chuck

No matter how old I get (as if I had a choice), I can’t seem to get better at that not-making-mistakes thing.

My latest screw-up was noble enough, but then. I got a garden variety case of the flu, but also a visit from my daughter at the same time. What to do? So I crawled out of bed, put my best Dad-is-healthy-now! face on, and got very stupid quickly.

I’ve been paying for it this week, every day hoping to make the jump back to where I was, forgetting that nothing really works that way, at least in this universe. So here we are, the end of the month, and the last part has been just lost.

Add to that dark, wet weather and my mood has been in the basement if my body hasn’t. I’ve found out that my strength is also my weakness, my endurance my fragility. My habits got thrown for a loop and I got untethered, and only now am I trying to pull all the ends back together.

So this morning I went looking for him again.

It’s been a big part of my program. People do different things, to varying degrees; if I thought there was just one way I’d have written that book by now. My way came about organically, from where I was to who I am, but every morning, pretty much, I start the day by looking for the drunk.

See, it would be bad to forget him, in the sense that he hasn’t really gone anywhere. We move on, but we also wear the chains we forge in this life. I will drag the drunk behind me wherever I go, and good for me. Sometimes I need a little extra weight to remind me.

Mornings were the worst, of course, because I’d wake up in full-blown withdrawal. Withdrawal is what people who don’t really understand mean when they talk about “physical dependence,” or “physical addiction.” It’s a shallow way to look at it, if understandable, because withdrawal is such a small part, if uncomfortable.

And it’s not really that the body is craving a chemical suddenly taken away; it’s more that the body’s normal functions have been put on hold, and when the chemical is gone things start getting back to normal. So withdrawal is, in a sense, the beginning of healing. Someone addicted to opiates, for example, has a lot of aches and pains just stored up, waiting to make their presence known. And then there’s the gastroparetic effect; opiates slow the bowels way down, so when the drug is taken away things can get messy. Withdrawing from opiates won’t kill you, but it might make you wish you were dead.

Withdrawing from alcohol, on the other hand, might very well kill you.

Booze slows everything way down, so when you stop drinking it all speeds up again. Heart rate, blood pressure, thoughts, everything. That’s why people shake. That’s why it’s so important to get medical help. That’s why the best thing you can do for an alcoholic in withdrawal, short of getting him or her medical help, is get them something to drink. Seriously. Keep them alive first.

On the plus side, with medical assistance it’s a pretty easy process. They can detox a drunk fairly quickly, a couple of days, and safely. Then the fun part starts.

So I used to wake up a mess. I recently found a word processing macro I’d written years ago. It was a key combination that saved a document and then opened a blank one, nothing complex. But it was oddly redundant, and I opened up the code to look at it and wonder what I was thinking, until I remembered. See, sometimes I’d press that combination of keys, open up a new document, and then press it again, saving the blank file and overwriting the one I wanted to keep, sometimes losing an hour or so of work. So I had to write a little backdoor save. All because my hands sometimes shook so much.

So that’s what I remember in the mornings, and what I have, nearly every morning, for the past 17 months. What it was like, what happened, and what it’s like now. Just a little reminder, when I’m down or sick or just out of sorts, that I used to be somewhere else, and that there are worse things than the flu.

It’s comedian/actress Brett Butler’s 50th birthday today. Ms. Butler had a spectacular flame-out in the early 1990s, getting attention for her comedy and then a temporarily successful sitcom (”Grace Under Fire”) until she imploded in a burst of booze and pills and some nasty work habits. She made an appearance on “My Name Is Earl” a while back but her resume remains awfully thin. But she’s 50, and I’m not.

I realized last night that I’m old enough to remember when people first started making fun of the way Tom Brokaw talked (back in the 1980s, as I recall; probably Harry Shearer). They drag him out on MSNBC from time to time, and it’s painful to watch; it’s like he’s got a fair-sized squirrel in his mouth. I imagine at his age he must go through life as a marked man, knowing somewhere there’s a syllable with his name on it.

I also realized that what I long considered just being a good citizen, doing my civic duty and staying informed, has become a niche hobby. Aside from like-minded people who wander in my particular orbit (and maybe read this blog; hi), most people I meet have only a vague sense that there is something political going on in this country. Some of them have heard of Iraq, but that’s about it.

So the hours I spend reading and watching, debating policy points and subtle demographic markers with my wife, must just seem bizarre to everybody else. This is how obsession starts: You think everybody else collects vintage ashtrays, too, until suddenly you’re talking about it at a party and people are backing away.

So, just to fill you in: Rudy Giuliani and John Edwards have both dropped out, so we’re essentially down to four candidates, two in each party (there are some Republicans hanging around, like Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee, but that’s really not going to happen). And it’s certainly not over; this thing could go to the conventions in either party, or both, and there might be lots of wheeling-dealing and maybe some surprises left. I’m just giddy.

Also? The economy really, really sucks.

There. My public service for the day is done. Now I can go to eBay and find ashtrays like everybody else.

Happy birthday to Judy Norton Taylor, my favorite Walton girl (she was Mary Ellen), who turns 50 today. I actually dated a young woman for a while who, among other things, reminded me of Mary Ellen Walton.

And happy 50th anniversary to Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, married on this day in 1958. An interviewer once asked Mr. Newman why, given his movie star status and obvious appeal, he’d never had an affair, and he said, “Why go out for hamburger when you can have steak at home?” Obviously a romantic, and I imagine Ms. Woodward reading that quote and rolling her eyes, but by any standards, and particularly Hollywood’s, it’s been a remarkable partnership.

Housekeeping: I was going to do a poll about that, about Newman films or screen partnerships or famous married people, but I think I’ll table the Tuesday polls for the time being. Only 20 or so of you participate (and many of you read this site via a reader, and polls require clicking through), and I have a suspicion there are some bandwidth issues. So maybe only occasionally from now on, we’ll see.

More Housekeeping: Some of you took a little issue with my premise yesterday that ditching the dog would improve your exercise regimen, assuming you’re into regimens. People and dogs; go figure. But I hear you. You were saying, hey, I get a good workout with my dog! All I was saying was no, you don’t.

Heh. Sorry. Just a joke.

Sure, it depends on the youth, size and vitality of the dog, among other things. In GENERAL, people. And really, what was on my mind was perception, anyway.

I gave a friend, a college instructor, who wants to lose weight. She bought a pedometer, and since she figured she was on her feet all day, walking all over campus, she must put in miles and miles daily and wanted to check it out. At the end of the first day, she took off the pedometer and found that she had logged about 45 yards. So, perception.

Exercise is GOOD. Dogs are GOOD. Walking the dog is GOOD.

If you want to lose weight, though, you have to change. If you never walk the dog and now you start, that’s change. Change is GOOD.

I’m just saying that to me — TO ME — walking a dog as part of a weight loss program is like babysitting as part of a socializing program. Yeah, sort of, maybe, well, no. Too many distractions, too many variables, too many limitations. A good way to start, though, maybe. And if you’re fit anyway, then obviously something is working right.

Eventually, though, you’re going to need to walk faster and further — if your experience is like mine, you’re going to want to.

And what do I know, anyway? Me, with a few months under my belt? Nada. Don’t listen to me, do what you want.

But lose the dog.

Happy 50th birthday to the LEGO, which not only graces this site but the carpets of unsuspecting parents everywhere. It’s not the day it was invented but the day its patent was approved, but we’ll still wish it well. LEGO, by the way, is a fusion of the Danish words “LEg” and “GOdt” (“play well”).

The National Weather Service teased us all weekend, threatening here, withdrawing the threat there, until it became The Boy Who Cried Snow. We stopped believing, or caring, and figured what would happen would, and possibly not here, anyway.

We woke up believers, with 5 inches of new snow and the very real threat of more tonight. I prefer watching it snow to walking in it, so a little picturesque scenery goes a long way, but at least it’s change, and not too much trouble, assuming we can get Beth to the airport tonight.

And since it’s change we’re talking about, and I believe up there I mentioned walking, and since I have nothing else to say this morning on anything else, let’s do another

Weight Loss Tip Of The Day: Lose the dog.

I like dogs, don’t get me wrong. And dogs need to be walked, and walking dogs is good exercise, although I’m not sure what bad exercise is unless it involves somebody other than your spouse. And I know many people who get themselves moving by the necessity of taking the dog out.

In terms of weight loss, though, I’d submit that you might as well go grocery shopping for the amount of benefit. Which is not bad, either; any movement is a good thing.

I speak from observational experience. I walk every day; I do it on purpose, for a purpose, and I see other walkers, too, many of them with dogs, and believe me we are doing two very different activities. Dogs wander, stop, sniff, backtrack and generally have a good old time, and the person on the other end of the leash is a passive participant (Jerry Seinfeld did a routine about this, which I can’t remember verbatim but he essentially imagines a space alien viewing a dog and its owner from afar. The alien sees one creature pooping, and one creature holding the other’s poop, and there is obviously no question who’s in charge).

So if you decide walking is part of your plan, lose the dog. At least part of the day. You’ll go faster, you’ll probably go further, you’ll burn more calories, you’ll rev up the metabolism better, and you might gain some self-esteem, who knows? Let the dog hold its own poop for once.