Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), previously known as Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD), is a mental disorder on the dissociative spectrum characterized by at least two distinct and relatively enduring identities or dissociated personality states that alternately control a person’s behavior, and is accompanied by memory impairment for important information not explained by ordinary forgetfulness…
— From Wikipedia.
I have a great relationship with my email account. When you don’t have any friends, an active email account can easily deliver a congenial sense that someone out there really cares about you… enough to send you the latest dieting information, for example.
Like this morning. I got two emails from people I hardly know. Actually, I don’t know them at all, but obviously they feel some connection to me, because they went to the trouble to find out my email address.
The first email was from Kathy Fishman, 99 Frank Road, Trailer #26, in Belgrade, Montana. (Who knew there was a town in Montana named ‘Belgrade’?) Kathy wanted me to hear about the latest dieting breakthrough… a diet pill called, by some, the “Holy Grail of Weight Loss.” The new pill is called “Slim New” and it will, according to one website quote, cause the pounds to “melt off like butter.”
Reading this information had a definite impact on me. I went directly into the kitchen and made some toast, and slathered it with maybe two tablespoons of butter. For good measure, I applied some blueberry jam as well.
About halfway through the third piece of toast, I came to the sudden realization that my relationship with my email account was probably part of the reason why I have no friends. Except, of course, my many, many online friends like Kathy in Belgrade, Montana.
And another part of the reason I have no friends: I’m fat. There’s something about fat people that makes us unpopular. Americans have, in general, a dissociative identity relationship with obesity. (See the handy quote at the beginning of the article for a quick refresher on the ‘dissociative identity’ stuff.) We’re very sure that obesity will likely cause us to die an untimely death from one of several fat-related diseases. But at the same time, most of us are fat… and seemly, have made a lifelong commitment to being fat. (However long “lifelong” might be.)
More than 2.1 billion people—nearly 30 percent of the global population—are overweight or obese. That’s nearly two and a half times the number who are undernourished. Obesity, which should be preventable, is now responsible for about 5 percent of all deaths worldwide.
— 2014 report, Overcoming Obesity, by McKinsey Global Institute.
Which is why I was really interested in the second email that I received this morning, from another new friend named Brad. (Not sure of his last name yet.) Brad wanted me to know about the thinnest and lightest iPad keyboard ever, the new “Touchfire” keyboard. After watching the linked video clip, I’m pretty well convinced that Brad is telling the truth; this is indeed the thinnest keyboard I’ve seen for the new iPad, which is in, turn, the thinnest version ever of the popular computer tablet from Apple. I’m something of an Apple fan.
(Another quick trip into the kitchen, this time for a healthy Apple. No butter necessary.)
As American consumers, most of us cannot manage to become thin, and stay thin. I’ve reluctantly come to accept that fact. America is destined to be fat — and also destined to be stressed and unhappy about it. We will be judged by our friends and relatives — especially, by the ones who were born skinny. But those judgements will rarely be enough to change the way we look. Their judgements will only make us feel more despondent about the way we look. It’s almost enough to make me thankful that I don’t have any real friends. (Kathy and Brad will never say anything about my weight; of that, I am very sure.)
But while I may remain unhappily overweight for the rest of my short life… for a modest investment, my tablets and keyboards can be thinner and lighter weight than ever.
Be grateful for small blessings.
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all.