A Word about your Love Handles

I was on the front porch when you drove by and I waved, appreciative of several things about you that are admirable --- pleasant personality, winning smile, your great taste in reading material, and I must admit, your love handles.

Wait. Love handles? Explain, you say.

Despite pressure by Hollywood and the media that we should all look slim, thin, and emaciated, I want to set the record straight. There is nothing wrong with love handles. Nothing. It’s no big deal. Practically everyone has them. I have a generous pair. When I power walk down at the beach, it looks like two basset hound cheeks flapping above my waist.

I’ve come to realize that love handles, like a family picture album, tell a lot about you and me. Love handles are the side effects of good times, of ice cream shops, hot pastrami sandwiches, biscuits with molasses, and God’s comfort food to Statesville --- Daylight Donuts.

Love handles tell people I’ve enjoyed life and that there’s a good chance the handles and I are up for most anything. We love parties, late night waffles, and birthday cakes. We eat pies and fresh baked cookies. We see nothing wrong with dipping garlic bread into a pot of spaghetti sauce while your spouse and dinner guests are yakking it up in the living room.

That’s why I’m glad, dear reader, you have the handles too. I know right off we can be good friends. People with six-pack abs think fun is exercising until their stomach is hard enough to crack walnuts on. However, people with love handles can appreciate putting on mitts and baking a good pan of cinnamon buns.

So, yeah, we’re going to be a bit chubby, but that’s not a bad thing. Most people over 40 are either really fat, sort of fat, or trying not to be fat. Either way fat is part of life. You’re a grown-up now. It’s alright. So you don’t have the body of an Olympic swimmer. You’re not an Olympic swimmer, you’re Bob, from accounting. You wear khakis and you haven’t seen your belt buckle since the Obama administration. Same as me. It’s okay, you’re still a wonderful person. Our minds are our worse critics.

Do you know why we have love handles? Because we’re lucky.

We’re the first generation of humanity that doesn’t have to gather or hunt to survive. Food is always within arm’s reach or a phone call away. We live in a country where homes have controlled air temperature so every day is perfect, and conducive to snacks.

Besides, fitness is now a marketing ploy driven by special watches and devices that count your daily steps as “real exercise”. Get it?

“I just walked from the parking lot to my cubicle. 80 steps!”

“Good job, Janice. You’re an athlete now. You should run the 10K. You’ll be needing some workout shorts and matching tops.”

Your handles are part of the journey of life. I’m 72 and you and I know these aren’t the Best Years of Our Life but there’s no need to endure it on an empty stomach. I’m on the homeward leg of life where you’re stuck in an airport, your belt has been x-rayed for warhead missiles, your flight is delayed, and you’re trapped in a lounge full of idiots with cell phones and voices like weed eaters.

So, you take life head-on.

You don’t get to be old by putting on a smiley face. What keeps us going is righteous anger at over-sized pick-up trucks, ugly buildings, and small print. Also, the occasional consumption of a delicious glazed donut does wonders. Did I mention Daylight Donuts?

I don’t care if we both look like a watermelon wearing sandals. I’ve never seen a jogger that looks happy. I think you’re complete. We both have nothing to worry about. Stay well, do good, and enjoy your lunch.