If you know how to spell hemorrhoid, you may be old AF.
If you’ve even thought about how to spell hemorrhoid, been reminded of and then possibly appalled at the double R construction, that little ugliness situated squarely in the middle, you may be old AF.
And if you think about the correct way to spell words, rather than letting Claude take care of all the inconveniences of writing and expression, the punctuation and dependent clauses and blah blah blah, you may be old AF.
A few years ago, I developed a case of third degree hemorrhoids. If you are interested in what separates the first degree from second, third, and ultimately fourth, have at it. I’ll leave it at this: I was quite glad to have been stranded at third, short of the home run of hemorrhoids. In hindsight—YES—it was a blessing.
I found a good doctor and had a minor surgery. Most importantly, though, I place a new, intense focus on fiber.
I don’t believe I was a terrible eater pre-hemmie, but I wasn’t focused either, not as consistent as I should’ve been, especially when it came to fiber. I would eat an apple a day because, you know, the doctors. Who wants to see them? But apples are also worth 4.5 grams of fiber a day, a fantastic base.
I love beans! Not everyone loves that I love beans, the two people that share my mailing address in particular. And I’m sorry, my beautiful family, and I always apologize, sometimes profusely, in those moments where our internal air quality is temporarily polluted. But a solid helping of black beans delivers 15 grams, and such digestive serenity.
I’m even on the psyllium husks, prescribed by my butt doctor post surgery. But I need to acknowledge the influence of a particular reader, who is rarely far from a Metamucil biscuit. He has destigmatized the supplement for the fiber deficient among our friends.
Nuts, seeds, grains. I’m digging it all, each day ensuring that I get a little of this and a little of that, to stake my claim as a fiber-wolfing machine.
Turns out that I’m fibermaxxing.
Are you familiar with maxxing? And it’s double consonantized assembly, harking back to our previous example? Well, this one is far worse.
According to Wikipedia, maxxing refers to optimizing or maximizing “a particular quality or activity.” It appears to originate in the gaming world and then, naturally, migrated to the incel space, where lots of male gamers gravitate. But those two subcultures are an entirely different essay that I really don’t have a whole lot of interest in.
What I am interested in is words. Right now I’m rereading 1984, by George Orwell. Max’s summer reading has been a struggle, to put it mildly, with every book abandoned on the early side. We had the grand idea of a family read to foster his engagement. No dice. While 1984 is branded as young adult, it’s also heady stuff. Maybe next year. That said, I’m into the novel, in no small part because of how it resonates with the current world.
A key element of the narrative is what I’ll call the abusive evolution of language, the systemic initiative of Big Brother to transition to Newspeak, the official Oceania language, slashing words from acceptable usage, combining others into meaningless abstractions: “fullwise,” “plusful,” “unperson.” All of this serves to limit expression and, ultimately, thinking.
So fibermaxxing echoes of this fictional world that feels less and less fictional, given the way that certain pants-on-fire liars are rewriting history. In fact, all the maxxings echo of an oncoming dystopia: looksmaxxing, gymmaxxing…may the gods strike down whoever first typed out jazzmaxxing.
Because these “terms” proliferate on social media, the trend of maxxing all feels in service to branding and influencing. Removing the beauty of words and sentences is part of that push, reducing everything to images that will ultimately try to sell you something so you don’t have to think. Click this, buy it, get it tomorrow, get it now!
Well, I’m cranky and old AF…and I like thinking. I overthink shit all the time.
Here’s my brand, without too much though: I would like to move my bowels in peace, easily, in harmony with the rest of my body, so I can get on with life, work, play. Granola with my yogurt. Dave’s good seed bread. Yeah, couscous! I eat it! It’s lovely.
Am I fibermaxxing? Hell, nah. But you better believe I took my fiber game to a new level.