{"id":1818,"date":"2013-12-30T02:07:38","date_gmt":"2013-12-30T01:07:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=1818"},"modified":"2022-05-16T16:23:05","modified_gmt":"2022-05-16T14:23:05","slug":"the-metamorphosis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/?p=1818","title":{"rendered":"The Metamorphosis"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/a>I am quite a sight. Despite the fireplace next to me, an afghan covers me from the waist down to my legs. I am squinting into a book about World War II and donning the Italian onesie \u2013 matching sweat suit \u2013 so that I sort of resemble a retired mob boss in an old age home. Part of me is living in total content; another part of me is swimming in shame. I am wondering where it all went wrong.<\/p>\n

And then I remember: I came home for the holidays.<\/p>\n

I am a 39-year-old reasonably successful man. I am good at my job and have a great career. I enjoy cerebral hobbies like reading, writing, and hating Michael Bay. And I enjoy active hobbies like walking, jogging, and hating Michael Bay. I speak and write in complete sentences. Usually. And I eat vegetables, I swear.<\/p>\n

When I arrived in Langhorne last Saturday, I resembled this man. I wore a tucked-in shirt and glasses. I wasn’t forced to squeeze into my pants like an overpacked sausage. I was able to have, maintain, and follow through on coherent ideas. I even managed charming conversations on Christmas Eve.<\/p>\n

But then things started falling apart.<\/p>\n

In the first place, there was food. There were cheesesteaks, pizzas, and carb-filled Christmas dinners, not to mention delicious spreads, dips, pies, cookies, and pastries. All of which I was allowed, nay, encouraged to eat. And there is a bar across the street from my house and I\u2019m only human.<\/p>\n

After my eating and drinking exploits, I found that my trousers were a wee bit tight around the waist (I lost consciousness trying to breathe). So I dug through my Christmas gifts and found a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt I got from Santa. Enter the Italian onesie. I could say that I haven\u2019t been clad in these since Thursday morning, but I would be lying to you.<\/p>\n

The extra calories have roused within me a sluggish character, like that of a 1999 Marlon Brando. I get winded by stepping over the doggy gate and flat refuse to go up steps that total more than 2. I read until drifting off to sleep, and grunt monosyllabic questions about meal times. My feet are always cold, as the blood is designated to other parts of my expanding body, so I have to wear shoes all the time. I have claimed the rocking chair in the living room for the growing state of Marlon Brandistan. I have placed on it a flag of malaise, and I sit there and roll slowly back and forth, enjoying the fa\u00e7ade of movement.<\/p>\n

I am taking advantage of my prodigal son status to conjure despicable meal combinations in my slothish brain: meatballs and mac & cheese, roast beef and pancakes, pizza and ranch dressing fried cheese sticks. I grunt these medley of foods and they become an awesome, disturbing reality. My state of hygiene has declined. Since I don\u2019t step outside anymore, I don\u2019t need to pretty up, or brush, or cleanse any part of my body. The onesie has become part of me.<\/p>\n

I’ve lost my glasses. So now, I sit in my rocking chair and squint into my book, awaiting full metamorphosis into Marlon Brando, 1999.<\/p>\n

I have to go. Cheeseburgers and mashed potatoes tonight and I’m hoping for Orson Welles 1981 by Easter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am quite a sight. Despite the fireplace next to me, an afghan covers me from the waist down to my legs. I am squinting into a book about World War II and donning the Italian onesie \u2013 matching sweat suit \u2013 so that I sort of resemble a retired mob boss in an old […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EvEu-tk","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1818"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5527,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818\/revisions\/5527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damiengaleone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}