NY Resolution Number One

It appears that 2018's New Year Resolution Number One is no surprise. It's the usual "this year I must lose weight" wish, the same one as popular every year since the forties of the last century. Before that, people were simply glad to get a good meal in. Resolution Two of all those years, should read, "surviving guilt for not completing R#1". Women used to have hips. It's a woman thing. Now it seems that other than the K family of fame, the hips-in-demand are those of a ten year old. Some people under the duress of The Camera, resort to surgery when even starvation doesn't hone their bodies into the lens-required shape that gawping millions will envy. Just check your screens. The nasty cat-calling texting that happens when a formerly already thin performer deigns to gain a couple of natural pounds, is witness to the insane pursuit of skinniness that warps intelligence. And "skinny" is no exaggeration. Sometimes when I'm watching a fashion show, I can't help but moan in pain for the almost bone-alone bodies that sashay down the ramps, their frames as narrow as their six inch heels. Okay, so they are fifteen year olds, but all too often, in spite of Vogue's denials, these wire-coat-hanger bodies are put on view and are admired by ordinary people who will give up good health to become what they believe Fashion dictates. This pursuit of thinness is big business and big business is convincing. Take a look at magazine racks anywhere and one of the items on the front page will have the word "diet" in it. I know women who get up before work and go running and then after work, dash off to the gym for more of it on a treadmill. And if they're not there, they are at hot yoga, pushing their already toned and tired bodies into so-called relaxation methods. Then it's home and the comfort of a salad with "lite" everything in and on it. They want to fit into their size five forever. On the other side of all this thin madness, is mounting stress, bulimia, Spanx and depression. One wonders how much our national medical budget is stressed with prescriptions for pain, joint surgeries and psychological treatments caused by this so-called healthy fad to be skinny. I use the word "skinny" because "slim" doesn't cut the fat, so to speak. "Healthy" is eating a nutritional diet, not dieting and denial. To blame genetics, dieters say is not true: "we can all be skinny". According to skinny doctors, everyone has to lose weight and exercise. I have one, and wonderful as he is, I come from a rather boxy line of Europeans and while the fat could go, the bones remain. People of my genetic pattern will never be tall, slender and skinny unless we are literally starved and even then, likely not. Obesity is a true problem that needs to be addressed medically and psychologically, but let us not be silly when it comes to fat. Everyone has a certain amount of it. And should. We need fat to draw on if our bodies are sick and we can't eat due to the effects of illness or disease. If Resolution Number One could ever be "eat a standard nutritional diet to lose weight if need be",  I am all for it.