When I worked as an Uber driver, one day I got a ride. I was supposed to pick up the rider at a nearby address, send him to a nearby Stater Bros, and come back. One of those easy and quick rides. Soon the rider Joe gets in my car, smiling and calm. His shirt looks largely oversized on the slim figure. After the routine checks, I tell him, “Please fasten your seat belt.” He follows with a smile. Then I hear him murmur to himself, a bit gloating, “One year ago, I couldn’t even buckle up.”
Life story is one of the rare rewards an Uber drive can get. I happily ask him. He happily tells.
Joe lives with his parents. Since a young boy, he found profound joy from eating, or, the profound pain from not-eating. One year ago, Joe weighed about 300lbs. His life was on the verge of collapse with the accelerating fall of many body parts, lung, liver, heart, and so on. He had to see the doctor. They made a plan for him that combined surgery and medical treatment. His stomach was cut in half, the fat removed. Two months later, he came back home with 150lbs.
Wow~~I shout. Joe tells me he is lucky. Nearly half of the patients come back to gain weight again. But he is in the other half. I commend, “You must be very disciplined and have a lot of exercises.” “No, not at all.” He says. After the doctor gave him green light to go back to normal life, the first thing Joe did was going to his favorite buffet restaurant. He used to eat as much as five big guys. The buffet manager feared him to death. But on that first day after surgery, he started to feel sick right before he finished the first chicken wing. This wasn’t on the medical report. His parents were thrilled. But he felt beaten up. He tried many more times before he realized that he’d lost the appetite, forever.
He sighs a big sigh and murmurs, “I lost the joy of eating, forever.” I look at him through the rear-view mirror. I see a sort of combination of pride and sorrow.
We arrive at Stater Bros. Joe gets off and comes back in just two minutes. He takes no grocery with him, but I notice a big bump under his prominent shirt –he keeps all the old clothes to remind him of the old days. He gets into the car and takes out a giant bottle of vodka. Seeing my shocking eyes through the mirror, he says, “That’s okay. I just drink a little. I finish this bottle in one week…hmm, two weeks……Maybe one month.”
He tells me, one day his friend invited him to have a drink, then he found the long gone joy came back. “It’s like I am seeing light in my life again.” I can’t help myself asking, “So you order a Uber for a bottle of vodka?”
He tries to comfort me, “Don’t worry. I know what to do. I have experience.”
“You can take a walk. It’s not far. It’s not hot right now.”
“I can’t wait,” with the same smile and calmness.
We arrive at the destination. He walks to his house, the giant shirt that used to wrap a 300lbs body flying wildly in the wind.
Sitting in the car, I was hit by some lines in the book Atomic Habits, “You can break a habit, but you’re unlikely to forget it. Once the mental grooves of habit have been carved into your brain, they are nearly impossible to remove entirely –even if they go unused for quite a while.”
My mind went to my Dad, who is now over ten thousand miles away. He was a military man. Transferred to local government, he became a heavy smoker –only male aliens didn’t smoke back to the 1980s in China. His health rung alarm bells when he was the fifties. One day he decided to quit. Then he started binge eating –so common among smoking fighters. His weight inflated. But he soon started to exercise. He ran, and ran, and ran. One year the city held a civil sports conference. He registered for the long-distance running of middle-age. On the game day, we all stayed at the finish line waiting for Dad, even though we were not sure he could finish it. Then we heard people shout to someone on the running track. They mistook him as one of the side-lookers crossing the road, as nobody behind him in the long run. But it was Dad. He was the champion!
Now in the eighties, he gets up 5 am every day, walks until 8 am. Summer or winter, snow or rain.
He not only fixed the habit, but also the groove in his brain.
