Weighed Down

He opened his cupboard, and looked approvingly at his brown pant. His new brown Van Heusen pant- which he had bought in that bumper Buy 1 Get 2 Free sale. He stepped inside the bathroom for a daily ritual that involved a trasparent, neutral liquid, and a fragrant, opaque, alkaline solid. As always, he readied himself for the shower by unbuttoning his shirt or pulling the t-shirt above his head, depending on what he forgot to change the night before. He eagerly looked into the mirror- was he bearded enough for a shave? Or could he get away with his overnight stubble? And what of his hairline? Was there more brown now? Or was the shampoo successful in arresting the recession? And recession reminded him of the US economy, and of subprime, and of Sensex and his own investment in mutual funds. Was this the right time for him to invest, or should he let the Sensex correct? Anyway, his more immediate concerns revolved around the huge mass hanging 80 cm above the ground, enveloped by skin, and holding 3 months worth of rich North Indian food and ice creams. As he turned his body by ninety degrees for a side view, he saw the mass stretching from the end of his sternum, hanging down low enough to eclipse the elastic of his bermudas, and extending far out enough to serve as a tray. In fact, he thought with half a smile and half a grimace, ants could use the edge of the tray as a suicide point. As he let the shower run, he tentatively poked his finger into the falling stream to see if it had warmed up sufficiently. No it hadn't. Then another grimace- not long back, he used to bathe in icy cold water everyday- he was not sure he liked this breaking-in into royalty very much. Anyway, he eventually stepped into the pillar of the hot, transparent, neutral liquid; rubbed his skin with the fragrant, opaque, alkaline solid, and followed it up by massaging his scalp with a fragrant, opaque, green liquid. After drying his body, he looked at the clothes bar with a confused expression. Which of the 2 banians had he worn yesterday? They looked so damn alike- both VIP Bonus vests and both bearing toothpaste stains. Did it really matter which one he had worn yesterday? Wasn't he used to wearing the same clothes for days and weeks on end?

Once he stepped out of the bathroom all dried, combed, boro plussed, deodorated, brylcreemed, undied, and banianed, he opened, once again, the varnished cupboard, and pulled out the brown trouser. His memory flashed back to the day he bought it- the room that was hastily converted into a retail outlet, the irresistible offers, the delighted son and the smiling mother, the trial room that was conspicuous by its absence, the crude wooden partition behind which many a seductive Hindi film heroine changed her clothes, and above all, the perfect-fitting brown pant whose buckle hooked up beautifully around his waist. As he slipped his legs through the brown pant and pulled it up, he reminisced about that happy June afternoon when he bought 3 Van Heusen pants (including that fateful brown one) for Rs.1099. But what's this! Why wasn't the buckle fastening now? Why were the two ends, now an inch apart, groping to hold hands, like lovers after a Hindi movie bomb blast pulling themselves towards each other for that last touch. But here, the two ends weren't pulling themselves- the now-happy now-stunned boy (or man) was playing matchmaker but all attempts to marry the ends failed. Thank god for making human stomachs pliable or else what followed would've shattered it to bits. He pushed his stomach in his with a deep breath first, then used 3 fingers, then 4, then his palm, and then his entire fist to flatten his stomach enough to make the ends meet. When he finally removed his fist and released his breath, the paunch overflowed on all sides. Worse, the pant squeezed him so tight, he feared his guts would travel all the way up and spill out of his mouth. (Later that evening when he undid the buckle, his stomach rushed out like crowds would rush in when the doors to the cinema would open.) He could still remember the time when size 30 pants would fit him with absolute ease. This sarkaari babu-type tummy was certainly not what he expected from corporate life.

As he walked out of his room with a heavy heart and a heavier tummy, he noticed that the lift was, as usual, out of order. Was it poor electrical engineering or was it providence forcing him to use the staircase? As he trudged down the stairs, he felt something he had never experienced before- a mass, enveloped by skin, 80 cm above the ground bouncing in front of him. With each step he took, his tummy was charting its own course. That was the first time he allowed a certain suppressed voice inside him to blurt "You are FAT!". FAT? FAT? The word pulsated in his head like a Bose speaker was placed inside. He, who till recently, was counted among the skinny, the underweight, the weak, was now in the league of the fat? Fat reminded him of Adnan Sami (before he lost 110 kilos); it reminded him of overweight uncles who looked like they'd tucked a ghatam under their shirts; it also reminded him of obese teenagers with fat cheeks, Mc Donald's burger in hand, and cheese streaming out of the sides of their mouth and dripping down on their respective trays (pun intended). But hey! Were things really that bad? He had just put on 10 kilos in 2 months (from 57 to 67), and had rendered 3 trousers and a pair of jeans useless. All he needed was a strict control on his diet, and a strict exercise regime.

For starters, he stopped using the lift, both at home and at work. His flat was on the fifth floor and so was his work desk. Five floors 6 times a day was a decent workout, wasn't it? He supplemented this with a complete ban on ice creams and creamy desserts. And of course, there was the regular night walk. To intensify his Mission Pant Fit campaign, he decided to pay the apartment gym a visit. He detested gyms in general, mainly because of the grotesque cutouts of men with swollen muscles and grinding teeth placed in front of them. He hated gyms also because of his nightmarish tryst with it 4 summers ago, when 4 days of gymming almost made him a living robot. The second attempt at gymming started as badly as the first. 15 minutes of furious cycling and 1 round of jogging led to thighs that throbbed like a frenzied heart, and a stomach that threatened to puke-aabhishek the road. He laboured up the stairs, threw himself on the bed, and tried to soothe his palpitating thighs, and his churning stomach.

It was October 18, 2007- more than a month since he gave up ice creams, shunned lifts, night-walked, and 3 days since he started cycling and jogging. With hope in his heart, pride in his efforts, a stomach that was peeping eagerly out of his navel, and a hand that was well positioned to pat his back, he stepped on the weighing machine. He adjusted his spectacles, then wiped the lens with his sweaty t-shirt, stepped off the machine, checked the zero-error, and stepped on again. The reading did not change- 68.