Sister-Friend Answers All

I look at her impatiently. "Please tell me the truth, do I look fat in these?"

"I'm sorry my dear, but I don't understand. Do you have your contacts in?"

"So you do think I look fat in these?"

"I am not saying that at all. I think you look fine, but my opinion does not matter. You know yourself and you know what you want from yourself. See yourself. Really see yourself, with your eyes, not with those distorted lenses that look at skeletal models and think they look healthy," admonished Sister-Friend.

"So, you think ..."

Sister-Friend looked levelly at me. "Do you think you eat in a healthy manner?"

"Well, I try to diet, but I eat a lot of junk food."

"Do you get fresh air and exercise?"

I squirmed. "Well, I just stay so busy..."

"Dear one, do not ask me to say to you what you do not want to say to yourself. You are not a child anymore and you must rely on yourself for discipline."

How could I argue with that? Then she took the sting out of her words by saying, "Besides, I am not one who can talk ... knowing what is the right thing to do and doing it are two different things. Benjamin Franklin, as Poor Richard, said that one should should eat to live, not live to eat."

She grinned. "What a silly, silly man!"