Technically, it’s not mid-winter, I know.  Technically, winter began only a few days ago. But I like to think of it as mid-winter because that makes Spring and Summer seem that much closer.  Calendar be damned.  It’s kind of like saying you’re 40-ish, when you’re really closer to 50 than to forty (which I am NOT, by the way), but in reverse.  (In that in one case, I’m rounding up, and in the other, rounding down.)  Either way, it makes you feel better.

The thing that’s so great about winter is that you get a chance to wear big sweaters and a giant coat.  For a seasoned camouflage dresser like myself, it really is a winter wonderland.  Don’t want that arm jiggle to show? Just wear a big sweater?  Feeling like those jeans are a bit tight?  Just wear a big sweater.  Worrying about those crows feet? Well, maybe not.  But you get the idea.  Sweaters, coats, scarves…they are all a weight conscious girl’s friend.

The only problem is, at some point, the sweaters come off. And for me, that point happened a few days ago.  Because at this moment, as I write, I am in Chacala, Mexico, looking at the Pacific Ocean crash against a pristine shore.  And when I got here, I realized that I had brought with me three new friends:  the roll of flab around my middle, the lovely bulge of blubber along the back of my bra, and the official beginnings of a neck wattle, evidently hidden under turtle necks for the past few months.

Now I know, I know, I shouldn’t complain.  Here I am, on vacation, enjoying the sun, the company of (actual) friends, a break from the city, and from my routine.  And yet.

There is nothing like putting a bathing suit on after a long fall of over indulgence and general slothdom to give a girl pause. To give a girl a reason to exercise, to eat healthy, to dedicate herself to the health and well-being of herself and her family. And yet.

Here I am in Mexico, where the tortilla’s are homemade, the chiliquita’s they serve for breakfast so sinfully fattening and good that anyone serving them should be tried and convicted of excessive temptation.  I’ll make the arrest and eat the evidence. I can’t diet on vacation.  It would upset the natural order of the universe.

There is a bright side to all of this.  The Mexican vacation will soon end, and I will be back in the land of the sweaters. Back in the realm of keeping it all covered.  And I won’t have to worry about it again until June.

Here’s to a long and cold winter!!