Breakfast Club With Me, Myself, and I

My 34th birthday came and went. I expected to become wiser overnight, with my hair all turning gray, wrinkles on my face, with a halo around my head. I didn't. Instead, I'm just an almost-old middle aged woman trying hard to keep sane.

Today is my third day trying to get back to my lifestyle a year ago - that of a regularly-jogging fat lady who found it hard to finish a day without sweating it out. My busy work, the recent rains and cold early morning weather, and yes, I'll stop making excuses, my horrible and protracted attack of idleness have stopped me from making my daily rounds along the city park. The result: 4 kgs of fat gained. Eeeewww!

Since Friday, I've been joining this city's fitness-crazy old ladies in their sessions of Zumba in malls. My friend Ronan found that ridiculous. He hates watching fat people dance while panting like dogs and sweating buckets of what he felt like oil. But his mockery notwithstanding, I decided to join Zumba in the mall and be gawked at by those skinny people in the crowd. And today, I tried to resume jogging. Two miles and I was already getting angina. My knees hurt. And I'm still fat.

And so I'm back in my favorite breakfast place. Until a few months ago, this has been my Sunday morning routine. After a jog and a some minutes of Zumba, I usually hole up in this cozy little diner and have a treat of fried egg and whatever meat there is.  The past few months, however, I've enjoyed the most unexpected of surprises: company.

You see I'm not used to getting company. I've been so used to having my meals alone. And I've stopped feeling miserable about it. Being alone in a diner, reading a book, or just staring into space has always made me feel superior over the other Homo sapiens who cannot endure being alone. It's like my superpower, my mega asset, the ace in my cards. And so when company came, I realized how pathetic all my previous delusions about my superiority were. Quoting Murakami, "Nobody wants to be alone. I just hate to be disappointed." Yes, I just hated being disappointed. And oh boy, like all these other ordinary Homo sapiens, I don't want to be alone!!!

For many weekends, I had company I enjoyed. I started missing my morning jogs because I felt I hated being alone and I no longer felt that loneliness is equated with being superior and powerful. I wasn't having breakfast alone and I was happier!

But the trouble with company is that you can't keep them with you forever. People have lives to lead. I don't own anyone. And whether I like it or not, I'm the queen of solitary meals and tables-for-one.

So I'm back to square one. I'm the girl who reads, the girl who runs, the girl who travels, the girl who writes. The girl who does everything alone. And yes, whether you like it or not, that makes me a superior Homo sapien. Enough said.

(Written in Taps and Mix, GenSan City. In a fit of self-pity, hahaha. Solitude makes writers in fat middle-aged ladies, I therefore conclude.)