among the big trees i seem small
by byron ballard

There is a beautiful place in Western North Carolina. To tell the truth, there are thousands of beautiful places in my native land. But the place I’m talking about here is a large stand of old-growth forest called the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest.

It’s in the western part of the state in Swain country. This forest was set aside in 1936 after the Chief of the Forest Service described it as one of the “very few remaining tracts of virgin hardwood in the Appalachians.” And recommended that “we ought to buy it to preserve some of the finest original growth in the Appalachians.” So the government did and we now have this large stand of old trees to enjoy.

The forest is named, of course, for the poet who wrote “I think that I shall never see/A poem lovely as a tree”—a man who died in Europe in the First World War. Kilmer is full of oaks, yellow poplars, big hemlocks and maples. There are dying giants all over the place and the pamphlet you pick up in the parking area warns hikers against going in to the forest on windy days or after ice storms. Good idea since the limbs on these trees are bigger than a lot of the trees most of us know.

We used to go there in college sometimes. It’s a long drive from Asheville and we were always up for a road trip to the big woods. There’s not much “civilization” there—just funky old trails and amazing old trees.

My daughter and a friend and I took an excursion out to Kilmer the summer after I started this Willendorf program. I felt the need to get out among creatures older and bigger than myself, to walk steep trails and put my feet in cold creeks. I needed a dose of nature to get myself reconnected to the natural world, to put my life in some sort of perspective.

There’s a strange thing that happens when you dramatically change the physical body you’ve been living in for many years. You start to feel a harsh disconnect with your self but also with your past and with the things around you. You look in the mirror and see someone looking back at you that is not familiar to you but is also not a stranger. You examine parts of your body that look different. You see things you haven’t seen in years or maybe ever before.

That makes sense, doesn’t it? But you also find yourself dealing with the alien experience of lean muscle mass, an altered center of gravity and the wonder of moving backwards in time.You’ve lost, say, 20 pounds and you now weigh what you weighed right after your child was born. You may find yourself thinking about that time, talking to friends about it, reliving it. You may begin to think of yourself as the age you were when you weighed that amount. You will find yourself “youthening” as the process continues.

I hope you will find ways to celebrate how you are now and will remember with gentleness and, if necessary, some humor, the person you were then. You may find yourself wistful for days gone by and this may be a time for you to recapture some of those old rowdy feelings. To re-member yourself a little nearer to wholeness through the youthening process. Enjoy, my dear.

Your self, in my opinion, is the muscle and bone and guts of you, as well as the spirit that resides within and around you. So when you change your physical self, there must be changes in the spiritual self as well. My friend DeerEyes, who practices a traditional Cherokee spirituality, says that the change occurs on the inside first and then is mirrored in the physical plane. Not being a Cherokee shaman, I don’t know if this is how it always worked. But I do know that when I heard the results of my bloodwork on the phone, I didn’t get scared or go into denial. My entire life simply...changed. When people comment on my successful weight loss and fitness program, they sometimes say, “It must have been very hard.” But it wasn’t hard, not the way they are imagining.

Don’t think I’ve got some sort of monstrous willpower or force of character that got me through this very hard thing. I knew my life had to change and so..I changed it. Yes, breaking my sugar addiction was hard. But as you learned in the Introduction to this book, I somehow intuited that I could replace the craving for sugar with a plunge into dried whole fruits. I didn’t do a Google search or research it in a medical library. I knew instinctively what my body needed to make this cellular-level change. And I gave it to myself. And you may be doing the same thing.
Good for you, by the way.

Let me return with you to the big woods of Joyce Kilmer Forest. We had heard the double loop trail at Kilmer described as a “granny trail” but that must have been one hell of a granny because the combination of heat and humidity made it challenging for all three of us. We swatted bugs and looked with thirsty longing at the little wild creek that plunged through the base of the hill below the trail. At one point, I gave in to my willful younger self and scampered off the path, down the hill and into the creek. It was worth the uphill hike back to the trail. The water was cold and fragrant and reviving.

The trees are magnificent. No, they’re not California redwoods but they are taller and wider and older than most other trees I’ve seen. I confess to several bouts of tree hugging and one period of sitting beneath this enormous old poplar and leaning my tired back against its truck. There was a gnarled frog near me in the dense bark and I watched her, camouflaged in the bark and very, very still. I wondered how it must be to live in that body, with its strong haunches and bulging eyes. And I also wondered if the frog made a conscious decision to be still in my dangerous human presence or if it was instinct. I stretched my legs and left both tree and toad behind. Sitting is not as comfortable as it once was--there’s less sit-upon on my posterior to sit upon. Another adjustment, another dose of change.

Not only do you have all this adjusting to do, you have friends and family who aren’t quite sure what to make of the whole thing. Some will be doubtful but keep it to themselves, some will be more blatant.

Because most people don’t like change. We fear it because we feel out of control and because we can’t be sure of the ultimate outcome. We fear change because, in the words of the Bard of Avon, we “would rather bear the ills we have, than fly to others we know not of”. So there may be people in your life who miss the “old” you and I am being charitable about that.

There’s someone I know who pushes a lot of buttons for me. She’s loves to play the one-up game. If I say I have a degree in paleontology, then she has two and is a guest lecturer at the Museum of Natural History. If I spent a week in London, she lived there for a month and no one ever suspected she was an American. You get the picture--someone who’s self-esteem is so low she must compensate all the time, must compete even with the people she loves, so that she’s always on top.
One of my Willi goals was to squirm my sumptuous hips into size 14 pants. So when I reached that, I told my nearest and dearest, expecting them to celebrate my victory. Almost everyone did--except my difficult friend. Her response was--14? I can’t believe it. I’m a 12 and you’re much bigger than me. You can’t be a 14.

Now, to be fair, she wasn’t doubting my word. She was coming face to face with the reality that the woman she had always thought of as “fatter than me” wasn’t anymore. Some of your friends, acquaintances and family--what I like to refer to as “kith and kin”--will feel threatened by the changes in your body. They’ll feel that way for a variety of reasons--your new body may make them feel inadequate because they haven’t achieved the same thing or they may have always had you as the benchmark of “as long as I’m not as fat as X, I’m not that fat”. My mother would’ve said they were jealous but I think it’s even deeper than that.

You changing your life may mean that you will put up with less crap from them, it may mean that you’ll have such delicious and powerful self-esteem that they can’t hurt you and feel better about themselves. There are all sorts of reasons that people will want you to not change.

Some of them will try to sabotage what you’re doing with clever quips or offers of food. Others will criticize where you’ve gotten in your program. They are the ones who will remind you that you still have those saddlebags and that they are very difficult to get rid of. Or they will caution you about eating too many apples, because even though they are very good for you, they still have calories.

If your experience is similar to mine, there will be people in your life who take a sudden interest in you because you are thinner. These people may have been lukewarm towards you when you were fat and happy. They may have ignored you in spite of your best and bubbliest personality traits. Some of those people in my life were folks I’d written off months or years ago, figuring they didn’t like me for whatever reason. I’d get philosophical and think--not everyone has to like me, it’s no big deal. It’s not a reflection on me, it’s a chemistry thing.

But it turns out it was a reflection on me. There were some people who didn’t want to associate with me, couldn’t even be friendly towards me because I was fat. This has been a horrific revelation to me. And my shock has been borne out in discussion with one of my circle sisters Terri. She and I are shrinking together, giggling about sizes and smirking about how tough and disciplined we’ve become. “No,” says she. “I can’t stay to chat. I’ve got to get to the Y.” And we both laugh like maniacs, cackle like Witches.

We weren’t cackling, however, when she shared that a co-worker had gotten chummy since her weight loss began. I can’t remember if this co-worker said she liked her better now that isn’t so fat, but this person did give Terri that impression. Can you imagine not liking someone because they’re fat? Maybe you can, I can’t. I dislike people who are mean or shallow or condescending but I don’t recall ever disliking someone because of their weight. Skinny people--I’m fine with them. Tall people--they’re okay. You already know I like round bodies. Maybe it’s my Pisces Sun sign but I don’t get it. Maybe I never will.

But I am blessed with an incredible support network of friends, family, and acquaintances. With few exceptions, they have cheered me on every step of the way and listened to me as I talked on and on about the Willendorf Program. They call me “skinny” and proclaim my youthful appearance throughout the land.Surround yourself with a big team of cheerleaders and get rid of or ignore the people who want you to fail for their own agenda. Either excuse yourself from their lives or shut them up with charm or--as every grandmother advises--just ignore them.

Too bad for them that this is your body and your decision. Keep listening to your heart and smile at the vicious little snipes. Living well is the best revenge. And now that I wear a size 12 and am moving toward a--gasp!--10, my friend seems a little less harsh. I think she’s getting used to the change. So another lesson is--be as patient with the people around you as you are with yourself.

Unless they push one button too many. Then you may need a long hike in the big woods. Put your trusty water bottle in your day pack, throw in a mango and some crackers and head for the hills. There’s nothing like a splash in the creek, a breathless uphill walk on a granny trail to get your whole little self into some sort of perspective. Trees are loving and gentle companions who don’t mind the occasional hug.

Byron Ballard is a Witch, bookseller and occasional writer who lives in West End in Asheville. Her plays include “West End Trilogy”, adaptations of “Beowulf” and “The Odyssey” and her books include “Back to the Garden: A Handbook for New Pagans.” Look for a free Willendorf workshop In September and feel free to contact her with your own “Willi” stories. [ byronb@buncombe.main.nc.us ]