It was my birthday, and I didn’t have a drink to celebrate. A few nights later I made a dinner of pork tenderloin with mushrooms and olives. The only thing missing was a glass of red wine, yet I stuck with water.
Alcohol is just one of several things I have given up recently. The others are carbs, sugar, dairy, processed foods, pleasure, joy, dessert, happiness, and. . . I must be leaving something out, the list is so long.
It’s not exactly true that I am doing this for Lent. Although the season of sacrifice has been an inspiration, what really brought this on was the overindulgence of winter, that amazing, gastronomic, hypersocial stretch of the waistband from the bounty of Thanksgiving through the party-hopping of December, onward to the feasts of Christmas, and coming to a rest with fat-chance resolutions in early January. Or not. In our neighborhood, holiday sequels erupt whenever the schools close for snow, as friends gather around backyard firepits with coolers full of craft beers and folding tables weighed down by plates of cheese, pots of chili, cupcakes, cookies, and many other things I’ve stopped eating.
But only for now, or thirty days to be exact. I am on a Paleo diet of puritanical extremity called the Whole Thirty. Its creators, Melissa and Dallas Hartwig, are cited in my house like church authorities in a theological debate. Is it okay to have honey in your tea though you’ve given up sugar? Not in this Paleo diet, which takes a dim view of substituting the permissible for the forbidden. The point is not simply to avoid certain foods, but to reestablish your eating habits on a healthier basis.
There are other diets even more strenuous, where the penitents cut out carrots, pears, and other vegetables and fruits that contain more than the prescribed amount of naturally occurring sugar. And, sure, no one can beat a longtime vegan when it comes to sacrificial purity. Still, I feel like I have earned my right to a clean conscience, despite the guilt I feel after sneaking a few droplets of honey in my tea.
But cheating at all, I am told by my wife Cynthia, the local keeper of doctrine, undermines the whole diet. Apparently, I should start over, this according to the Hartwigs. Too bad, I say. I am not starting over.
As a matter of fact, I wasn’t really paying much attention to the extra pounds of winter. Biking to work and playing a couple of sports, I get plenty of exercise. When my clothes feel a little snug, I skip dessert and cut out alcohol for a few days, then, voilà, I am back to fighting weight.
My Lenten sacrifice was going to be lame, as usual, giving up drinking during the week and trying to be less quick to anger when I find my children playing on the roof or drawing on the furniture with Sharpies. Then Cynthia said she wanted to do this Paleo thing.
It sounded difficult. Immediately I pictured myself ruining her chances by coming home in the evening with a long baguette, a hunk of cheese, and a growler of our favorite IPA, and saying something stupid like, “What’s wrong, babe? You seem upset. How about pasta for dinner? I’m gonna make that cream sauce you like so much.”
So, to avoid becoming an obstacle, I decided to join in. It fits with my sense of what keeps a marriage going in the hard spots: a will to submit, to surrender, to give up, as in giving up being right. Giving up being indifferent to issues that your spouse is passionate about. Giving up the possibility of giving up, because people are depending on you to earn a living, to come home, to be around, to be the person you are. A couple years after I got married, I gave up smoking, and ever since I have been giving up one thing after another.
There’s a 70 times 7 logic to marriage. How many times should I try to put my wife’s feelings first? The answer is not 490. To me, the answer is something like, as many times as you possibly can.
When you think you’ve been humble enough, when you think you’ve been on your knees all day long and deserve to stand up, that’s when you have to remember that your spouse has to put up with you all the time. The least you can do is let this one thing go. And the next. And, if you can, the one after that.
For that reason, I gave up alcohol, for which I have an old fondness, and carbs (likewise) and processed foods and so on. Because living with me is no piece of cake.
