The Whole Wide World

The other morning I put on a shirt I have not worn in a few months. This proved to be a stressful event that plagued my day. The shirt was snug. It was not snug a few months ago. So then I put on a pair of shorts that I also haven’t worn for a few months. Yes, I am in Antarctica and, yes, I packed shorts. For the record, they are gym shorts and I brought two pairs. I decided early on that I really should have only brought one pair, so I have only been wearing one pair. This way I wear them til they are well loved and leave them behind in skua and have the second pair as a new pair for my travels after life on the ice. Anyways, the shorts were snug, too.

It was a little confusing at first, these snug clothes. The clothes I have been wearing over and over don’t seem snug. Okay, maybe a little bit more snug than they were seven months ago, but not as snug as the shorts and shirt I hadn’t been wearing. After letting this roll around in my brain for a few hours, I came to the conclusion that the clothes I have been wearing have been gradually expanding along with the gradual expansion of my body. Great. How sneaky.

I resolved to try and be better with my food, but honestly, I don’t see that happening. Imagine having delicious daily baked bread and dessert provided at every meal and at no cost. You’d probably eat them too. I did go two weeks, or maybe it was ten days, back in the summer without eating dessert. The sense of accomplishment was nice, but it was generally a sad time. Seriously though, what pleasures are left if I deny myself of bread and cake?! It’s not like I don’t exercise either, I go make movement in the gym 4-6 times a week.

The reality is that movement in the gym is probably just replicating what my normal day to day movement would be in the non frozen world and it isn’t offsetting two baked goods and bread helpings a day. Don’t get me wrong about my food choices either. The majority of my plate is veggies and I don’t put pasta/rice/taters on it, ever. By the end of the day, I came to the conclusion that these snug clothes are just par for the course down here. It’s currently -44F and I haven’t seen the sun in how many days? Did Sheryl Crow just croon through your brain, too?

While I can’t deny I am low key stressed about the snug clothes, I am also not. I know that I am relatively healthy, my food choices are limited, and this is a temporary situation. And while I’d prefer that only my face cheeks have dimples, well, c’est la vie.