Romance:From Fat To Fatale(8)
OK. So Mavenka is never going to win a Noble Prize for smarts but this was like leading a virgin-fresh missionary to the cannibal chief's dining table on a feast day. In they rolled - and I mean rolled - these two butterball babes with faces like two freshly dusted dough-nuts and I just knew we were going to have a fun time. You can picture Mama Bulgari's expression as a chubby grinning challenger dared to enter her domain to offer advice about food - and at supper time.
It was a recipe for serious pain, Mama smiling sweetly and exuding all the charm of a boa constrictor that's chosen you off the menu list for a light snack. Small talk about the benefits of a healthy, balanced diet. Mama nodding wisely.
Then the real purpose for the visit revealed itself as Mavenka's butterball friend started handing out leaflets and sample sachets round the dining table, offering a wonder product, a new miracle powder that would replace meals and make everyone thin and beautiful and the subscription was only for one year and the cost was really less than a pack of cigarettes a day, taxes included. Mama eyed our visitor carefully, like a skilled horse trader evaluating a broken down mule, and asked her gently how come she was still carrying enough cargo round her belly to sink a battleship.
There was a moment of pain in our visitor's eyes before she lifted her chin and announced that it was true that she did have awfully big bones but that her condition wasn't really her fault. Oh, no. It was all because of her faulty genes. Fat just ran in her family. This was the moment when Miclav, my ever charming and gallant brother, looked up from his emptied plate and announced that the Bulgaris must have exactly the same genes so there was no point trying to fight Mother Nature. With that precise pronouncement of profound wisdom and erudition, he raised one capacious cheek, squeezed his eyes tightly shut and broke wind with enough gusto to ripple the dining room curtains before asking Mama with a big oafish grin what was for dessert. She looked at him proudly as if he'd just demonstrated some arcane gift for mental calculus and stood up to wheel in the next heaped and quivering round of goodies in the everyday evening Bulgari food fest ritual.
We should maybe ask ourselves here - was Mavenka's jelly-belly friend really a nutritionist? The kindest answer would be - probably not. An evening's sales training in someone's den, an armful of leaflets and order forms and she probably thought she was going to save the planet whilst funding her twelve-donut-per-day calorie habit. Just an easy way to make a few bucks on the side and everyone keeping fingers firmly crossed that the miracle powders didn't actually kill anyone and result in a class action law suit. So my judgement of nutritionists was probably a little unkind, a little off the mark and totally biased just because my single encounter to date with a nutritionist had been with one of Mavenka's freaky little friends, who'd turned out to be the ultimate heavyweight nut in nutritionist.
I had a morning off from classes, which looked like a perfect opportunity to meet the old doc's recommended diet specialist but, to tell you the truth, my hopes weren't exactly soaring. I guess at the back of my mind I was still thinking that I'd probably end up with the doc's fall-back position - Plan B - that good old cocktail of prescription medication that would take the edge off my blood pressure and maybe help me to squeeze off a few pounds before I imploded from the fat that was slowly choking my youthful arteries.
I really didn't know what to expect when I rang the bell on a small office door in a business unit close to the town centre. There were chiropractors, a bone manipulator - made me think I could use that description for myself on occasion! - A fortune teller, a pet supply company, a small law firm, a couple of dentists, and a Thai massage service - are you taking notes here? Some of these addresses could be useful one day - and, of course, the nutritionist. The door opened and a small, deeply tanned, lady smiled at me, stretching out her hand to welcome me and show me inside her office.
She was lean like whipcord, her face lined yet strong. I absolutely couldn't guess her age but I had the feeling she was probably a lot older than she looked. I immediately thought Marathon runner and a shiver of dread ran down my spine as I imagined her chasing me down some dirt track with a bull whip, urging me to run faster, to burn off that flab or die! Her head was tilted to one side as she asked me if I was feeling OK, her words dragging me back from the nightmare image of being whipped through the burning scrub by some demented fitness fanatic, trapped on an endless quest for a leaner body.
A couple of moments later I was sitting on a comfortable chair on the other side of a neatly ordered desk, a PC screen arranged to one side and lots of certificates on the wall, declaring the courses and qualifications that made this lady a bona fide nutritionist. So, she said, what can we do for you? I looked down at my spreading bulk, slowly cascading from my neck down towards the floor, and shrugged my shoulders, as if my needs weren't obvious.
I'd brought the notes from the campus medico and handed them across the desk.
She had the bluest eyes, wasn't wearing glasses and I watched her as she breathed slowly and scanned the medical report's conclusions. She nodded slowly a couple of times, shook her head with a smile, put the notes on the desk in front of her and leaned towards me. Honey, she said, you're seriously messed up and no mistake. But she said it with a smile, which really did not make me feel any better at all. You're all messed up six ways from Sunday and you want me to make everything better for you, is that right? I shrugged again.
Either it's you, Ma'am, or it's a bunch of prescriptions or the doc doesn't think that medication is the best way forwards for me. So what do you think? Are things as bad as I look? The nutritionist leaned back in her chair and said quietly, No, Missie, it's a lot worse than you look. Because the serious stuff is on the inside where -