The Exertion of Sitting.

Hi! My name is Stephen and I am fat.


We humans revile the fat man. That's OK. You can't help it. Neither can I. Fat people disgust me, too. Probably more.

Don't feel bad. You keep away from the ridiculously obese for the same reason you'd stay away from the bubonic plague. Your genes tell you fat = disease. Stay away. Don't catch it.

It's wet and cold today although the forecast is for heat and sweat. That's great for me. I once had a friend named Troy who owned an Alaskan Malamute. Malamutes are hardy animals with insulation of thick, fireplace-rug fur. These dogs pull sleds through the Arctic and happily sleep in the open during blizzards. Troy named her Snowy. She almost died every Melbourne summertime, until it did against the bullbar of a Toyota Landcruiser. My friend was too lazy to walk her, so it walked itself.

I'm in The Westin lobby in Melbourne, climate controlled, where the chairs are the ideal ergonomic inclines for laptop computers on the lap. The lighting is soft honey and acoustics are smooth calf skin leather. The invisible vortices of the air circulation is a marvel of thermodynamics and fluid mechanics. My Chicken Marsala fueled fart would be more likely to reach the retired millionaire reading the Financial Review one metre away in a thunderstorm.

I come here a lot. The Westin has free wi-fi and $6 lattes. Once or twice a week I'll equalise my karma with this multinational hotel chain by overpaying for a coffee. The unrushed contentment of my betters prove money does buy happiness. The younger betters sally forth to airports or business appointments, war-painted in pinstripes.

Sometimes I'll see someone semi-famous. Two weeks ago it was Megan Gale. She'll be Wonder Woman, soon. Today Australian Davis Cup tennis captain John Fitzgerald wanders by. He sees me recognise him. My belly fat dome bulges my creased slate grey cotton tee.

Comfort is a big thing for me. Sitting position, especially. I'll explain. When a fatty-fat sits, everthing pushes up. Thighs spread sideways, stretching the legs of my jeans. My arse flattens sideways, pushes upwards, filling every cubic centimetre of usually loose hanging denim in the seat of my jeans. The pressure from overfilled jeans pushes up my belt, cinched under my gut overhang. The belt is onto its last notch. It acts as underwire does for a push-up bra. Lifts and accentuates. My pushed-up gut pushes up my man boobs.

Gratefully, today, my tits are concealed by a jacket. The jacket doesn't hide the belly.

I'm so self conscious of my bio-dome belly that I subconsciously pilates b-line buried stomach muscles. I also take shorter, smaller breathes. Regular breathing swells the belly extra inches. That, I can't allow. The hour turns, as I sit, I become hypoxic. My heart rate increases to deliver less oxygen, faster. My blood pressure rises. My short, shallow breathing becomes laboured. My chest tightens. My brain pounds with the beat of my arteries.

I heave. Once. Twice. The brain pressure pounding is so loud now. I'm having a sleep aponea attack, wide awake.

I worry about having a stroke, a heart attack, long term hypoxic brain damage.

Sitting down is too tiring. I'll wind-up my laptop power cord now and pay the $6 I owe the Westin Hotel Group. John Fitzgerald is nearly fifty years old. He and I don't share genes.

My jeans are a size 40. It used to be a lot worse.