Hey!

There is no place to begin. The one thing that I struggle with the most is the ONLY thing I have really wanted to change. The part of this that makes me sad is, had anything been different about my heart attack I would no longer be here and yet the predominating thought is...the same as it always has been...when do I get to stop being fat? When I imaging a guy who has faced the possibility of dying...he is answering bigger questions. Who am I...what do I want t do...how can I impact the world. Not me...I wonder when I will be able to make it without going to bed disappointed in myself. I can't really exercise the way I was..I will be able to, but I can't seem to wade through the rehab. I still have 30 more visits before I am officially cleared to resume normal exercise. Then I have a new hole to learn to live with.

You often don't know what someone means until they are gone. You get so used to experiencing their impact that it becomes a cohesive glue that help hold you together. Well, now that my Dad (and both my parents) are gone, I realize, in small bits, what has been lost and how much I looked to them for guidance and approval. They became, and of late especially my dad, a barometer. I was becoming my own person and wanted him to really see it happen. These words make me really really sad because the only way he knew was with this unshakable struggle to find the strength to change. So, they unfortunately knew a son who never quite got where he wanted to go. And so another night falls and with it another surrendered day. Surrendered to not meeting my own birthright...a legacy of my own....a vision. I want to weigh 190 lbs. I want to be strong as hell. I want to know how to fix a few things...a lawn mower or a tiller. I want to be the very best musician I can be instead of trying so hard to hide my shame behind the label of "good" What happens when I risk it and really TRY? I don't know..

But I do know this: I am an addict. I hate saying it...I hate BEING it. I hate that I feel soooo hopeless about my weight...so embarrassed... Even with my own heart scare...it is not death that scares me...it is NOT living. And that is what it steals from me. Life. I can't do it alone and I am panicking (a blind panic as one of my funny character voices may say) Why not me? Why can't I be one of those stories that I want to read?

Ya know, some people have huge inheritance. They get cars, or lots and lots of money...vacation homes..whatever. I got some of that too...my father had saved money so that we could have something (his father left him with bills and daddy did not want that to happen) He accomplished that. But the money and the things are not my real inheritance.

I got tenacity

I got a will --one that bends but never breaks

I got a backbone.

I got knowledge.

I learned how to grow anything I want to eat.

I know what it is to sweat.

I got a fierce sense of

Determination

Ethic

Accountability

I got humor.

I got generosity.

I got compassion

I know how to feel my heart

and listen to my head.

I know how to be quiet.

and

I know how to say

I

Don't

Know.

These things that I received took many years to amass. I wanted nothing from this man but I got all I could ever need. I know in my heart that it is enough to move forward, but easy it isn't. Not sure what my next move is, although it most certainly will involve a major level of determination regarding food. I can tell you this..I am not done. Had I been, we would have all had a grand time at a visitation of my own,,...but we didn't did we? So, I want what I have, and I will be damned if I let something as old and tired as weight hold me down for the rest of my life.

I will be using some of my inheritance to change things.

Stay tuned

Roy