“Out of the Mouths of Babes” is the old idiom that suggests that children sometimes say something so honest and so correct that they have the wisdom or understanding beyond their years - OR something everyone was thinking but probably wasn’t the most tactful comment to make in the moment. While it is true that children will say almost anything that comes to mind, I’m convinced that older people sometimes share this same tendency.

A few months ago I noticed that no matter how much time I spent in conscious thought willing it to shrink, my waistline seemed to be growing. Even more sad was the fact that, while my table muscle was growing, my other muscles were shrinking! Determined to do something about this travesty, I hired a personal trainer to help keep me on track, set up a program for me, and encourage me when the time came where I wanted to quit. I asked around and located a trainer who I thought would be suitable for my long-term goals (one of which is to run a marathon). It wasn’t long before I was working with Courtney Roth (aka The “@!*&^%!*! Slavedriver”) and we were on our way toward the Mr. Universe contest - or dreaming about it anyway.

Shortly after beginning this path to fitness, my entire family was gathered at my grandparents’ home for someone’s birthday or other special occasion. We had all just finished a wonderful meal and I was enjoying a very respectable size piece of my grandmother’s delicious, moist, made-from-scratch, melts-in-your-mouth, velvet red cake with thick, creamy icing. As this particular cake is one of the seven wonders of the world, I saw nothing wrong with enjoying one innocent piece. My grandfather, however, noticing the vacuum-like action of my mouth, said to me, “Christopher, are you getting fatter?!” I told him that, although I had been getting fatter up until a few weeks prior, I was now working with a personal trainer and was on my way to a skinnier me. He said something to the effect of, “Well, it just looks like you’ve put on some weight around your gut.”

The thought crossed my mind later that week that, while the truth was not particularly enjoyable, it was indeed just that - the truth. I had been putting on weight and it was overdue that I do something about it. While other people had been telling me that I “carried my weight well” and they “could not tell any difference,” my eighty year old grandfather told me the truth about how I looked.

Want to know the reality about how much red cake you have eaten as you go about your life this month? Ask an eight year old or an eighty year old; you probably will be told the truth!