Fat Woman Walking

The Author with Auntie, Summer 1968 _____________________________ “D IET.” Can you tell me how that word makes you feel? Oh, Lord. Don’t tell me you’re a Gestalt... No, Ms. Lee. Eclectic. Dabs of Freud, Jung, Horney, Skinner, Rogers, Ellis, and ‒ yes ‒ some Perls. I’d hate to think I’ve traveled all the way into my inner depths just to find a Cuckoo in a hot tub.... I like to think that I take the best of what psychiatry has to offer and give to my clients what they need. Now, then, where were we? “Diet.” Ah, yes. You were going to define that word for me. Well, maybe to ordinary people, “diet” is just another word in the English language, having one or two meanings, the primary denotative being, “to cause to take food” as a verb, and “food or drink regularly provided or consumed” as a noun. Then there is that lesser denotative meaning, a dieter’s term, which has to do with eating by prescribed rules established by doctors, nutritionists, families, peers, frie...

Psychedelic Bingo Ain't Gonna Work on Dizzy's Farm No More __________________________ P sychedelic Bingo . What old boomers play at Paisley Palace Nursing Home in 2035. Flashing strobe lights, the scent of medicinal weed hanging in the air, mingling with patchouli, Pine Sol, rubbing alcohol, scented Depends – Piss. “Pump it up!” the 20-something Bingo caller will yell. We’ll be hard of hearing. Years of cranked up Grateful Dead and Steppenwolf concerts taking their toll. About time for a winner. The caller, a pale, young part human, part cyborg with rainbow dreadlocks and gaunt body, wants to split, to get on with her young robotic life, her young lover, probably with matching dreadlocks, passions, jutted-out hipbones. We hardly matter. “B-5!” spews out of the caller’s mouth, a brown sound morphing into airy blue. “G-59!” plays like a green note with a blue-brown under melody. The air fills with Bingo numbers, colors, and anticipation. If I could captu...