Lost My Pants

I’ve lost my pants. Surely I put them somewhere reasonable. Surely I did not take them off in public and leave them somewhere. Surely they are here someplace! They are my black pants – jeans actually, that aren’t the usual denim, rather some brushed material that's a magnet to dog and cat hair from miles around. I need these pants. They’re the ones that fit a little looser and are, of course, black. The slimming-black. The don’t-notice-my-big-butt black.

I lost a-heap-o-weight in 2011 and 2012. As I went down in sizes, I shopped at Goodwill to subsidize my wardrobe. Approaching my goal weight, I got rid of all my large-sized clothes. Then I had the year-from-hell in 2013,

 and I didn’t care. The rare thing that consistently gave me comfort was food, ice cream especially. I gained 20 pounds. My BMI went from normal, right past overweight, to obese. Not morbidly obese, thankfully, which is the land I once inhabited. But obese? Heck, I thought I was still looking normal. Sheesh! But, I guess it’s all relative and we are an obese America.

Still, I can’t find my pants. The pants I bought after I gained 20 pounds. My only black pants. Laundry hamper? Nope. Laundry room? Nope. Dresser, closet? No, no. Stack of clothing that doesn’t fit? Mending? No and no. How about the garage (who knows?)? The only two places still left to investigate are the suitcases from a recent trip and my wife’s closet. (I do the laundry, day after day, 30 years. Surely I can tell the difference between my 16’s and her size 8.)

I also can’t find my sweatpants. I’m getting pretty darn tired of going outside to fill the bird feeder when it’s five below zero and all I’m wearing is a t-shirt and slippers. How did a formerly type A personality fall to these depths? I’m getting pretty darn tired of it.

But maybe, just maybe, they’re right in front of me, and I’m not noticing.

My roommate got a pet elephant. Then it got lost. It's in the apartment somewhere.  -Steven Wright

The range of what we think and do is limited by what we fail to notice. And because we fail to notice that we fail to notice, there is little we can do to change; until we notice how failing to notice shapes our thoughts and deeds.  -R. D. Laing

Yours truly,

Butt-Naked