We need more mirrors

August 19, 2008

Last night I went out to dinner in Boston’s North End. I was lucky enough to get a window seat overlooking Hanover Street.

While enjoying the Restaurant Week fixed-price menu (and I say enjoying to be polite, the meal wasn’t that great), I spent some time admiring and deconstructing the fashion and fitness choices some people had made. For the most part people were wandering by with ice cream or pastries in their mouths, so you might be able to see where this commentary is headed.

That’s correct. People are BEASTS.

When did it become so important to keep a parcel of food in one hand and a black and white cookie shoved into our face? Are people inordinately concerned that Al Gore and the other eco-fatalists are right and we’d better plump up now before the planet turns into a sauna?

Granted, there’s a perception that fat people float pretty well and one of the first regions to go “glub-glub” will the the Northeast. But I’m not sure fattening up on Mike’s Pastry is the way to save your body and soul.

It might taste good for a moment, but I blame this particular activity for the subsequent fashion disasters that follow.

For instance, when was the last time a tube top looked good on anyone? Settle your PC instincts for a moment – this is an innocent statement -but the only time a tube top works is when the woman wearing it is about 11 because there is usually nothing to cause the garment distress.

I assure you that tube tops all over Boston were screaming for help as they struggled to hold up flesh and fat for which they were never designed to contain.

Men are no different. Barrel-chested would be a compliment for the 20 or so guys I saw wobble past the window. I certainly wasn’t doing my physique any favors by mowing down three courses, but I didn’t follow it up with a fistful of cookies and a trough of gelato.

Perhaps this is too graphic for some, or maybe it hits a little too close to your lap. But where are we headed as a nation and a people and a civilization if all we can think to do is stuff stuff in our gullet?

I’m tempted to call the groups that recently studied fitness and nutrition levels in the Boston area schools to find out more. But it’s a sunny Tuesday morning and I’ve got to get to breakfast.

I am not even close to literally starving. Although I am hungry.

Keep reading!