One of the first posts on this blog was about the 7 Day Detox Miracle, the book that has become my escape route from my lifestyle, a formidable counterpoint to the excesses I typically enjoy… excessively.
A wiser toad would probably attempt to attain some kind of temperance in their path, delicately balancing on the pinhead of the good life while never chasing too far the demons that serve that delicious table. But I’m a sucker for a well read demon and I love the company of wolves. I would trade a dozen well reasoned gentleman for an hour with a charming criminal because, believe me, I’ve searched and I’ve found for certain that a serious laugh can only be shared in the shadows of what is explicitly not permitted. Frankly, who but someone willing to bend the law to sate their desires could truly understand what it means to be properly full?
But anyone who runs with demons and theives knows that, no matter how attentive you might be or how smart you might think you are, the thief will always walk away with your wallet and the demon will inevitably and eventually win. Make no mistake, gambling is the high art of the Devil and you are only renting time at his table.
A dedicated sensualist knows this and will always stick around long enough for a seasoned whooping from the old beast, another welting reminder of who collects the taxes and who makes the rules. Like a good dog always running back for another boot from his vicious master, the sensualist will stick around until just before that tank runs to vapor but never so long as to lose the wind all together.
All this is a long way of saying it’s reckoning time. The Holidays came along, once again, filling us full of strange cocktails and seared meats, with lightbulbs and culdesacs, pedantic movies and beautiful songs, chance meetings, cold nights, bonfires, shotgun shells, hillarious headaches and comfortable couches from which to spectate on the whole roman glut. Like a good con man the Holidays gave us every idle wish we thought we ever wanted and then beat us back down to earth with the invoice of our ascension.
Now it’s time for this fat shaman to put Humpty back together again.
I start my detox tomorrow. 2 days of fasting, followed by several weeks of macrobiotic foods, daily exercise, daily meditation and easy living. I will keep close to a daily record on this blog of the foods I eat, the exercise I do and a cursory examination of how this is affecting my mood, my dreams, my weight, my cognition and my creative output.
I’ve performed this detox many times previously and after every one I feel so good that I swear up and down that I will integrate a more sensible regimen into my everyday life. But this is a fool’s errand and not how I can live. I love living loud and painting in broad strokes so this time I will not fool myself with false promises but attempt to settle into the more vibrant rhythms of my style of life: 2 months of strict living – healthy eating, no alcohol, steady exercise – followed by 2 months of reintegration.
We’ll start there and see how long it takes me to drag myself away from that beautiful Devil’s Banquet once again.