Tag Archives: autonomy

Cross-Legged

Cross-legged: (adj) having the legs crossed

The greatest gift that Mother Nature and Father God can impart to you is a weakness.

Without a weakness, you begin to believe you’re self-sufficient and don’t need help from any outside source. On top of that, you might just create deceitful interpretations of the truth when its proven that you are not “all that and a bag of chips.”

A weakness gives you the ability to know where to start working every single morning.

A weakness warns you that too much confidence is blustering wind with no lightning or rain.

A weakness makes you more compassionate to other people who happen to share a “soft spot” in their abilities—just like you.

A weakness is what makes you strong.

I do not know whether I was born fat, possess a fat gene—or if I’m just caught in the middle of some metabolic paradox.

But my obesity has created a weakness in my life.

Some people may consider it a weakness of my own making, or perhaps one created by my parents “making out.”

It doesn’t make any difference. I’ve had to base my journey on working around my girth—beginning at my birth.

Therefore, I can tell when one ounce leaves and seven pounds arrive to comfort my body over the loss.

I know when I’m on a good spin and when my health is being spun.

I don’t need a mirror to observe the “battle of the bulge.”

For you see, one of the ways I have always been able to tell whether I am beginning to move toward a more normal weight or traveling into the morbid regions of obesity is:

The simple action of crossing my legs.

Now, at this point every fat person in America reading this will howl with laughter, and every skinny-ass individual will turn and look quizzically at another scrawny person as if to say, “What does he mean?”

For when you’re fat, your thighs have grown a fondness for each other and are accustomed to being close. If you think about it, crossing your legs demands that these thighs develop autonomy. Also, your joints—which are essential for convincing one leg to go above the other—are sometimes jammed up with fat globules, which makes the process of crossing one’s legs quite athletic, if not painful.

Therefore, during times of weight loss, I have celebrated my victory with a leg-crossing—occasionally only able to maneuver the “wish bone variety,” where the right foot rests upon the left knee. But a few times, I was actually able to have the legs completely crossed—where the right knee appeared to be humping the left one.

When this has happened I have actually teared up—mostly because it was such a blessing to do such a simple thing.

But partially because being foreign to me, it was as uncomfortable as hell.

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Benefactor

Benefactor: (n) a person who gives money or other help to a person or cause.

Dictionary B

  • The problem with autonomy is that it’s lonely.
  • The difficulty with collaboration is that it generally votes itself into a position of doing nothing.

So what is right?

When do we have an idea that is good enough that it needs a benefactor to fund it immediately instead of waiting for the greatness of the idea to bloom?

A good question.

I have had benefactors in my life. Even though each experience has eventually gone astray, I am still grateful for the generosity of those who believed in me for a very special season.

The reason that benefitting others eventually goes afoul is that when we try to control both the creativity of another person and the circumstances of life, we always end up looking foolish.

My benefactors were very excited about my gifts, abilities and talents–until they realized that “all good things come to them who wait.”

When their generosity did not bring forth immediate profit, they became impatient and started pointing fingers–many of which fell in my direction.

They left me too soon.

It’s not their fault.

Patience is where we possess our souls.

Yet most of our spirits are infested with the demon of shortsightedness.

 

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Aboveboard

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter A

Aboveboard: (adj.) legitimate, honest and open: certain transactions were not totally aboveboard.

Some things are not your business. But more things ARE your business than I sometimes think should be.

That’s the truth.

The easiest way to get in trouble as a human being is to walk around with a chip on your shoulder, proclaiming it’s YOUR life and nobody else has any right to interfere. The more you insist that people have no right to question you, the more questions will be sent your way.

You are much more likely to be audited by the IRS if you complain about paying taxes than if you just pay your fair share and move on to the rest of your life.

You are much less likely to be looked on suspiciously concerning your particular sexual practices if you don’t wave a flag and object to scrutiny.

People are funny in the sense that all of us want to keep SOME secrets, but we’re very suspicious of anyone who’s secretive. You might consider this to be hypocrisy–if you didn’t realize that it’s just human.

I’ve got it figured that if you want to live an aboveboard life, you can probably keep about five things secret–as long as you thrust to the forefront twenty admissions that make you forthcoming and honest. The minute someone thinks that you are hiding something, they assume it’s the tip of an iceberg of iniquity.

It is a bad profile.

There are things that I do in my life, or things that I feel, that I would rather not share in public or with the viewers on Entertainment Tonight. It’s not that I’m exactly ashamed of them–just not quite certain of all of their origins, so I wouldn’t be able to totally explain my inclinations.

But rather than spouting off my particular need for reclusion and autonomy from the rest of the human race, I would much rather be aboveboard on fifty other things about my life that don’t really make any difference whatsoever–and leave the general populace to believe I am transparent.

  • So I will gladly tell you I’m fat. First of all, it’s faily obvious. I lose nothing in that revelation.
  • I will tell you that I do not have a college degree. At my age, no one really cares.
  • I will tell you that my legs don’t work as well as I would like them to. I have other talents to keep me mobile.
  • I can admit that I do not like jalapeno peppers and still be in favor of immigration reform.

There are so many things that we can present, be candid about and aboveboard that we don’t need to act defensive and careful around one another.

So would I mind if you found out my five little private areas? No. I mean, I’ve never slaughtered chickens for the Kentucky Colonel. It’s just that they aren’t the brightest bulbs in my stage lighting. And I would much rather draw your attention to other areas of my weakness, and in the process present myself as adorable instead of unapproachable.

It is good to live an aboveboard life. Otherwise, you’ll have everybody grabbing a flashlight–and checking below your decks.