was just what I needed to see in order to get moving towards a healthier me.

I can't tell you how awful it was to see myself as others see me. True, others don't zoom right in on the worst part, and sit there and obsess for 40 minutes, but still.

It was a wake-up call.

There are several members of my congregation who have made recent comittments to healthier living, prompted mostly by some troubling, but reversable, diagnoses. I've been noticing, and supporting them in their efforts with my stealth observations. Maybe it's time I got the hint.

We're going back to California at Christmas to see old friends, visit old haunts, smell the ocean, drive up to the top of this mountain. I want to have established some newer, healthier habits by then. I want to be able to walk to the top of the hill (not the mountain, but the hill) on my old campus without feeling as if I was going to pass out.

I guess I start today.