This is my mother’s legacy. More than twenty years ago, she systematically cut off communication with each of her six remaining brothers and sisters and eventually my grandparents with little explanation. When I’ve asked her why, her response has veered from the reasoned–a family squabble after her baby brother’s death when I was eight–to the hyperbolic–”You’ll never understand what they’ve done to me!”–but none of it ever seemed like a good enough reason to cut me off from the rest of my family before I was old enough to decide for myself.

As a boy, my grandmother was basically my surrogate mom, taking care of me after school, driving me to little league practice and Boy Scouts, always slicing my sandwiches diagonally, the way I liked them. My grandfather, far crasser than Grandma could ever be, was my father figure, teaching me the virtues of manhood from his chair, clicker in hand. My aunts and uncles, a motley assemblage of McGuigans, all played pinch-hit parent when my mother was working, giving so much of herself to her jobs the way I now do with my career, the other edge of the strong work ethic sword she’s passed on to me.

Over the last five years, my mother has cut me out of her life, too. It started with unreturned phone calls and emails, which later turned to letters and cards, each bearing more chat and history, catching her up on what she’s missed until I accepted that my mother can’t miss what she doesn’t wish to be part of at all. After two years, I wrote less and less and eventually gave up after sending her a picture of the baby’s first sonogram last Mother’s Day and never hearing back. In the card, I wrote, “I know we’ve had our problems, but I want you to be part of this baby’s life.” I was convinced her first grandchild would turn her around, and when it didn’t, I didn’t feel sorry for myself but for the little boy in Jaime’s belly who wouldn’t know either of his grandparents on my side of the family.

Then, in November, the week of my thirtieth birthday, a package arrived from a mysterious address with an all too familiar cursive. I knew immediately it was my mother, and when I opened the package sitting in Jaime’s car before our breastfeeding class, the box was filled to the brim with boy’s baby clothes, a short note where she said she knew the baby’s gender because “McGuigans produce boys,” and, at the very bottom, a Christmas ornament, my first Christmas ornament, dated 1981. Jaime asked if everything was okay, and all I could do was cry like the baby she was about to push. I had assumed my mother didn’t care about me anymore when I never heard back after sending the Mother’s Day card. I knew she was still alive, but it was easier for me to pretend she was dead, slowly cutting off my emotional attachment to her until she was a memory, a shimmering light in the distance slowly fading into nothingness. Staring into the box resurrected the pain I forced myself to bury and left me with so many questions I’m not ready to ask. Six months later, I still can’t look at the baby ornament without that overwhelming burn of sadness creeping up through my throat and around my eyes.

Another package came New Years’ Eve, more clothes and a note asking if I received the first package, wondering about the baby. I should have been happy that she cared and was concerned, but I couldn’t be, spiraling into a pit of anger for avoiding my attempts to contact her and regret for not replying after the first batch of clothes. I still haven’t written back or even sent a thank you, a picture of the baby, something to acknowledge we did, in fact, receive the packages. Each time I’ve sat down to write my mother I struggle with what to say, veering from the logical–”Why didn’t you return my phone calls or letters?”–to the hyperbolic–”You’ve hurt me more than you can even imagine.” I’m not ready to pull the Band-Aid off that wound, not until it scars and fades into the skin, because it hurts less to imagine it’s not there than to face the blood, the puss, the way the crust forms around the opening.

When I finally do write, I want to tell my mother I miss her, that her first grandchild, Sonny, is my greatest work of art, that I think about her everyday, especially when I say, “Oh my God!” with her Brooklyn-born disbelief or laugh so hard I snort, both of which I inherited from her, that for the last five years I wondered if we’d ever see each other again, that sometimes I feel like an adult orphan, that I wish I had a parent to be proud of me and how far I’ve come. I want to tell my mother I love her, but I wonder if she loves me back.

NAKED BABY!

1) There’s nothing more loving and humiliating than sniffing your child’s ass–Poop check, I call it–when he farts right in your face.

2) Poop checks are an anomaly only parents will ever know–unless there’s some ass-sniffing fetish I haven’t heard of yet. In our house, one with a baby, two adults, two dogs and a cat, we don’t live by the axiom “Whoever smelt it dealt it,” and instead do the rounds. First, depending on who smells it first, we’ll look at each other. “Oh my God! Was that you?” And if it is, our quiet smiles give it away. When we’ve ruled each other out, we move on to Sonny and the obligatory poop check, putting out nostrils against the rear of his soft diaper and inhaling the bouquet. If it’s not him, then we locate the dogs. Most often the culprit is Lulu (You read about her penchant for vomit-eating here.), our 20-lb Boston whose SBDs linger long after the pin is pulled from the grenade. If it’s not her, we know the cat didn’t cover her latest contribution to the household, and then we call her a dick the next time we see her.

3) I am becoming one of those weird men who’s into feet, but not just any feet, Sonny’s feet. His elbows, too. I find myself kissing and massaging the tender bottoms of his feet and meaty rolls around his elbows because, unlike mine, his are perfect. Sometimes, when I’m raspberrying his little toes, I wonder how his will ever look mine–hairy and dry and rough and scaly. Right now, they are so perfect, like the unturned pages of a freshly printed newspaper or a pair of new sneakers before they have creases in the soles, and although I know Sonny’s feet and elbows won’t stay this way forever, I pledge to embarrass the shit out of him with stories of nibbling on his little toes whenever he starts dating.

4) “NAKED BABY!”

That’s what I yell whenever we strip Sonny down to his diaper and give him some Tummy Time in the near-buff. (Word to the wise: Don’t let your baby be completely naked without taking proper measures to ensure you don’t get pissed on. You think, “Oh, he can’t piss that far!” and then he does, and you find yourself both proud of his distance and horrified that you must now clean piss dripping down a wall several feet away.)

Like kissing his little feet, “NAKED BABY!” reminds me how precious Sonny is, how unashamed he is to be naked. I used to run around my house naked all the time when I was a child. Well, not exactly naked, I had these yellow galoshes and a fireman hat that I’d gallop around in while my mom played records. Sometimes I’d tie a towel around my neck, pretending to be some naked superhero, flying around with my arms stretched out, like Superman. When I look at the “NAKED BABY!”, I always want him to have this level of trust in the world, to believe he can be naked and not be ashamed of his body and its differences. But parenting a young child is truly about achieving a proper balance of knowledge and innocence, teaching them enough about “the real world” to not crumble at the sight of adversity while ensuring they maintain a level of wonder that allows them to not be fearful of the unknown. Hopefully, that means we’ll have more “NAKED BABY!” in the future.

Jesus rose from the dead, so you can eat me without sin.

I do not believe in God, but I haven’t always. I was raised in an Irish Catholic family and for many years went to mass every Sunday, Wednesday, first Fridays and other mornings whenever Grandma took me to school because she went most days of the week, and although she isn’t able to go as much anymore, she now watches the service on public access. I have received a majority of the sacraments, have a confirmation name–Richard, after my uncle/Godfather who passed when I was seven, and will forever remember the “Our Father” even though I haven’t recited it in over a decade. I still say “Oh my God!” and hear the Sisters’ voices reminding me not to take the Lord’s name in vain, and I’ll never forget that particular smell of church, the lingering echo of smoke, wood and old paper, and the way the sun came through the tall stained glass windows creating a cascading rainbow of light across the pews.

It was around sixth grade when I began questioning the existence of God, unable to understand why my father left, my family was torn apart and most of the boys in my class and neighborhood abused me so ruthlessly for my weight. If God existed, why would so much suffering occur in my little middle school life and far more in the entire world? I hadn’t quite grasped the concept of free will then and wouldn’t learn of Anselm’s ontological argument or Augustine’s Via Negativa for years, but, at an early age, I did know that if God existed I would need actual physical proof and until I had it I would continue to question, as I would with the existence of ghosts and Bigfoot. When I confessed my doubt to a priest before my seventh grade Confirmation, he simply suggested I pray, which I did throughout my teen years, asking God for answers, for a sign that my diminishing faith was part of my path, like the Parable of the Prodigal Son, yet God never answered. I thought there was something wrong with me. Why couldn’t I just believe like everyone else?

By high school, when I went to an all-boys’ Catholic school, I was veering into agnosticism, interested in exploring other faiths and belief systems, slowly accepting my doubt as more than a whim. When I graduated, after discovering Camus, Nietzsche, Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot,” my atheism was budding, fueled by anger, confusion and teenage disillusionment. Within my first few weeks of college, I switched my major from Film to Philosophy, partially because most of the students in my school’s prestigious film program were boring and vapid, and my detachment from the Catholic church and the faith I was raised in truly began. I read Kant, Descartes, Kierkegaard, the existentialists, the utilitarians, ethical relativists and in the end, all the theories and arguments for and against the existence of God only confirmed that I do not believe. A decade later, I finally feel comfortable admitting it publicly. After all, atheists are as trusted as rapists.

I hadn’t thought much about my lack of faith until last year when Jaime became pregnant. I knew we wouldn’t raise our child to believe in God, permitting him to choose his own belief system once he was old enough to understand the implications and make an informed decision with conviction. Jaime wasn’t brought up in the church, although she considers herself an agnostic, so when I said that I didn’t want to baptize Sonny (Please don’t tell Grandma!), I think her reply was “Hell no.” I assumed raising our child without God also meant no Easter, Christmas, and the assorted other Christian holidays that came with a day off from school, but Jaime felt differently, telling me “I do not believe in the resurrection of Jesus, but I do believe in the Easter Bunny and egg hunts.”

For my wife, God isn’t a prerequisite to celebrate holidays because, in her eyes, Easter isn’t the holiest day of the year–it’s the chocolatiest. She didn’t sit through the marathon of masses–Holy Thursday, Good Friday and the long Easter Sunday service; avoid eating meat on Fridays; and sacrifice something for the forty days of Lent leading up to the Sunday where Christians across the world celebrate the resurrection of the Savior. For Jaime, Easter is painting eggs and hiding them in the backyard and waking up to a basket of Peeps and chocolate bunnies, experiences she wants to share with Sonny because she loved them so much, the surprise and wonder from the Easter Bunny’s treats only found in childhood. Jaime feels the same about Christmas, which I didn’t put up much of a fight over because I love the joy in her eyes when we put up the tree, bake the cookies and open presents, and understand why she would want our son to have it, too.

But, despite the lack of religiosity in the celebration of holidays in our home,  I am not exactly comfortable with it. When I finally accepted my atheism, it seemed wrong to participate in these holidays because they don’t mean anything to me, and I know they mean so much to so many others. Jaime didn’t struggle with her own faith, as I did, so turning Easter into a day of candy and ham instead of the holiest day of the year isn’t an ethical question for her. It’s simply about fun, family and coming together over a good meal.

Besides the holidays, I also struggle with how we’re going to raise Sonny as a non-believer in a world full of believers. How will we explain what makes us different from the families of most of his friends and classmates without making him self-conscious of our decisions and way of life? How will he reconcile our paganistic celebrations of these holidays with the world’s more religious versions? How will I? And will we be able to maintain his childhood innocence in the face of it all?

I wish I had answers to these questions, but I only have more doubt and uncertainty, though I do know, for me, praying isn’t the answer.

It can get lonely on this plateau.

People keep telling me I’m losing weight, but I’m not. Since my weigh-in of 208 lbs. on Dec. 6, Sonny’s due date, which doubled as the date I set to be under 200 lbs., my weight hasn’t dropped much, ranging between 206 and 216, depending on the time of day, how much water I’ve had and some other factors you probably don’t want to read about.

I have officially plateaued. My body has adjusted to my new lifestyle and no longer burns calories at the same rate as when I was heavier, reaching a point of diminishing returns. Last time I was here I thought I needed to “quit being a pussy and take it to the next level,” something I told myself often. I believed all the health and fitness advice I read in mens’ magazines, which are basically like Cosmo but with fewer mentions of the G-spot. I pared down my diet to a list of foods I could count on two hands (protein bars and shakes, meat, chicken, pasta, rice, some fruit and vegetables, yogurt and these awful low-fat soups), ratcheted up my work-outs to six days a week and cut everything out of my life that wasn’t part of this “clean” lifestyle I wanted to live, one that wasn’t sustainable. When I broke my diet, I beat myself up. When I didn’t lift as much or sweat as heavily as the work-out before, I beat myself up. When I missed a work-out, the stages of grief settled in, though usually I just stayed in the anger stage until the next work-out when I pushed myself harder than before. I wasn’t exercising to become a healthier person–I was punishing myself for a lifetime of overeating and depression, which only made me want to eat more and fall deeper into that hole because it was comfortable and safe, and food, more than anything else, made me happy.

Unable to reach my goal weight, I slowly began to loosen my restrictions, eating ice cream and other foods I had sworn off, drinking, partying, and then hating myself for my choices the next day, waking up in a food coma, my stomach swollen well beyond its capacity, or with an awful hangover, forcing me deeper and deeper into that hole. Soon, it all snowballed, veering back into old habits until one morning I went to the gym determined to get back on track but doing it the wrong way. I let my pride, my manhood, my quest to not be “a pussy” drive me, skipping stretching and warming up and heading straight for the bench where I was determined to lift my max weight with more sets and reps than I was capable of–not because it was a goal but rather a punishment I believed fit the crime. Halfway through that work-out, I felt a pop in my back, pain radiating down my left side and up into my shoulders, the part of my back I hurt when I was in a car accident years earlier. I should have stopped then, but I didn’t because I wasn’t a “pussy.” I truly believed being a man meant not being weak or vulnerable, and for a boy becoming a man without a father in his life, my entire existence was about proving my manhood, being the toughest, strongest person I could be, and always ready to kick somebody’s ass. But that one pop crumbled my facade the next morning when, getting out of bed, muscle spasms leveled me, turning my back, shoulder and neck into one massive knot that would take three years and multiple chiropractors and massage therapists to undo. During that time, the hole grew deeper and wider, if only to accommodate my body, which grew by 80 lbs., as well as the massive load of depression and anxiety tethered to my slowly disappearing neck. Eventually, the hole found its terminus, though I had several starts and stops, believing I’d hit bottom only to re-injure myself or be struck by a trauma–a burglary, being hit by a car, a near assault, losing my mother– turning back to food for happiness, making that hole a little deeper, a little wider.

This time, I am trying not to fixate on my weight, which, as of yesterday, was still 208 lbs. more than three months after my goal weigh-in. Instead, I focus on my strength, the way my clothes fit and–the completely unquantifiable–how I feel. I am stronger than I have ever been in my life, but what drives me, what pushes me out of bed each morning, isn’t this belief that I cannot be a pussy, this false sense of manhood and pride. I am motivated by my desire to live a healthy life, to become the person I know I am capable of being, the man of a few specialized talents, the fat kid who wants to tell other fat kids the truth: it won’t get better until you’re happy with who you are, and ultimately, to be the father who’s always there, none of which a scale will tell me.

Mansierre or bro--you won't catch me wearing one!

“I don’t have boobs anymore,” I told Jaime in disbelief while looking in the mirror after showering, the once-too-tight bath towel wrapped neatly over my hip bones, which I can now locate by sight and don’t need to bore my fingertips into the fat hanging from my sides. Recognizing I was no longer mansierre-worthy–or bro-worthy, if you prefer Cosmo Kramer’s moob pun–was a revelation, one I am extremely proud of because, like most fat boys, boobs weren’t just an indication of my fatness but an invitation to publicly shame me with titty twisters and purple nurples, one of the reasons I never enjoyed swimming or playing any team sport involving shirts and skins.

But it isn’t just my chest that’s more barrel than bosom–my entire body is dramatically changing. When I walk, my shoulders are squared and back, and I can feel my muscles bulge with each step. All of my t-shirt sleeves fit like skinny jeans, creeping up my arms, unable to keep covered the loaded guns beneath. My pants, whether belt-fastened or with waistbands made of elastic, sag like I shit myself, yet fit snugly around my thighs, two taut sausages ready to rip through their intestinal casings. My chin has abandoned its double, and the space between it and my chest, known to skinnys as the neck, is visible without having to tip my head back like I have a nosebleed. Also, that new world, my neck, formerly the area of my body covered by my second or third chin, doesn’t require intense scrubbing to clean the dirt from between the folds.

My body doesn’t feel like mine anymore. I am more muscular than I have ever been, even when I lost all the weight the first time. I can run long distances without losing my breath and at multiple speeds, like the part of my brain controlling my legs is a stick shift, letting me push into another gear when catching a bus depends on it. I see people at the gym, who weigh far less than I do, not able to keep up with me, and I wonder if, when they were younger, they were the predators, the purple nurplers, or the prey, the purple nurplees, and where we both fit on the spectrum now.

Sometimes I don’t feel like myself anymore. I look in the mirror and don’t see the same person. Something happens and I don’t react in anger, reflexively, out of instinct and then gorge myself to cope with my stress, emotions and poor choices. Exercise is how cope now, and I have an immense, almost unrelenting amount of energy for it, making my recovery days torturous, not restful. Ten years ago, recovery days were for hangovers, for the mornings after I ate myself into a state of pain that could only be forgiven through severe acts of starvation and self-degradation. Then I never thought I’d be anything but fat, that I’d always have boobs, a minimum of two chins and cankles, that I’d break a sweat just getting out of bed.

Am I no longer fat if I don’t have boobs? This is the question I keep asking myself.

But each morning, I always get up. I always throw on the clothes, pack the bag, start the coffee, root through the fridge for whatever leftovers Jaime has ziplocked me, measure out the chia seeds, soak and mix them in juice and head for the gym, only after I tickle that little boy’s cheeks and steal a few kisses, equally hoping I don’t wake him up and hoping he does wake up and gives me one of his perfect smiles before falling back asleep. I do the same to Jaime, though her smiles lack his toothless perfection (Sorry but you know it’s true…) and she falls back asleep much more quickly.

Some days I’ll get to that train station and want to turn around, just a few blocks from more love, more sleep, more of the both of them close to me, but I never do. I get on the train. I drink the coffee. I find wherever I last left off in whatever book I’m reading (Currently, Nicholson Baker’s “The Anthologist.”). When I get to my stop, sometimes I think about heading over to the other side of the tracks and going right back home. I could call-in sick. I could miss a day of working-out. There’s always tomorrow.

Then I think about the graffiti I pass on my walk from the train station to the gym, which I saw my first day back at work–and back to my regular work-out schedule–after my seven-week paternity leave, blood red spray paint blazed across the white wall.

Over the last eight weeks, this has become my mantra, a serendipitous fortune cookie paper taped to the wall of my brain. If I want to reach my fitness goals, my life goals, and become the person I want to be, the revolution starts with my willingness to change myself, which means I can’t do what I did before when I didn’t see the results. I have to keep pushing myself out of that bed and farther away from where I want to be right now, with Jaime and Sonny, to be where I want to be for the rest of my life, happy and healthy with both of them, but for longer than I would have been if I hadn’t pushed in the first place.

When I finally make it to the gym each morning, I know I’m changing myself, and when I get to work, I look at Sonny’s picture on my desktop and smile. Occasionally, Jaime will email more or little notes about how he rolled over, or was licked by Lulu, or farted so loud during tummy time he scared himself. I can’t be there for all of it, but when I am, I’m thankful for my family and our small island of blankets and warmth.

I don't think kryptonite made him vomit.

1) There’s something Guinness-ian about the force and distance that vomit can fly out of Sonny’s mouth after he’s done Superboy, which is what we call it when we hold him horizontally and fly him around the house like Superman, or Spaceboy, which is what we call it when we hold him vertically and thrust his body into the air while making exploding, spaceship-lift-off sounds, for too long. He loves it; he loves it; he loves it; and then he pukes. Hopefully while we’re in the kitchen, the only room in our home that isn’t carpeted, making for easy clean-up.

2) The definition of “easy clean-up” has changed rapidly in our home, from “only needed one wipe” to “at least, he didn’t shit through his diaper.”

Defined as scenes from my favorite movies, “easy clean-up” was Cameron Diaz’s hair in “Something About Mary” and is now more like the chainsaw scene in “Scarface.” For perspective, “the worst clean-up ever” would be like the redrum scene in “The Shining,” where those creepy twin girls are in the hallway and the walls are pouring out blood.

3) I am so glad we do not have twins.

4) “Easy clean-up” has a new definition when doing Superboy in the kitchen (Thankfully!) and Sonny, while laughing, vomits all over himself, my hands and the floor, and Lulu, our vulturous Boston Terrier, fulfills her dogly duties by lapping up the puke as it drips from my fingers and Sonny’s lower lip, still trembling with joy, before we can even take a paper towel to the mess.

5) “Cleaning” should never be defined as allowing your baby to puke all over your home and your dog to lick it clean, leaving that breastmilk and dog spit shine.

That white spot to the right of her nose--yeah, she can't reach that with her tongue.

6) There’s something that can only be defined as wrong when Sonny has a small round of Spaceboy followed by a quick kiss shower ending with a big lick across his face by Lulu whose mouth and snout are suddenly coated with a thick burst of vomit, which Jaime and I would clean up if we weren’t laughing so absolutely hard we both made our respective noises–mine, a snort; hers, a shallow gasp–that indicate we’ve laughed for so long we’ve overloaded and lost our breath. At first, Lulu loved it until she couldn’t lick the last bit of vomit from her nose, and instead of cleaning it, we just pointed at her and laughed some more, and then I took some pictures (“Sonny, here’s the time you puked all over Lulu’s face and she couldn’t lick it all up and got mad…”) and finally cleaned her face.

7) We’ll be an evolved species when we’re born with Siamese twin puppies who can clean up after us.

Elissa, you know I hate being wrong, but I'm glad you were right.

“I’ll never write memoir.”

I remember telling this to Elissa, my former intern and now soon-to-be published memoirist (I wish I could say she learned it all from me, but maybe a couple of choice Brian-isms have infected her brain), once when we were talking about how her book was coming along. Elissa disagreed, telling me I had a voice for memoir–I just needed to give it a try.

Then, a few years ago, I was struggling to write a poetry collection I’ve since abandoned–a few good poems but even more shitty ones–and a novel Jaime panned after only making it a few thousand words in. I was ready to be done with writing–to close the file on my career, sick of making small talk at readings with other writers who had projects, awards, reasons to get up in the morning and put black on white while I plugged my novel, my collection of poems, as if I was actually still working on them. The answer to “What are you writing?” became as bloated as my stomach, knowing “a novel” would raise some eyebrows, despite also knowing that “novel” was an overstatement of the 30,000 words of bullshit taking up residence in my hard drive and time-sharing my brain space between work and worrying about my own artistic failure. I had been trying to kick start this blog, too, because everyone was doing it (The fastest way to a book deal is to start a blog or kill someone in Italy after all.), by posting book reviews, dispatches from the world of failed grant writing and little posts about the correlation between poop and coffee. (You won’t find those on here anymore!)

My refusal to write memoir wasn’t because it can be a genre wholesaling woe, redemption and that fine line between self-awareness and self-absorption. I was just too scared to be so revealing and couldn’t quite find the threads of my own stories worth yanking out and showing you. The real gift of nonfiction is the distillation of the most honest and personal stories of one’s life, which, although they have just happened to you, are told with such force and sincerity that readers believe it could have happened to them. A few years ago, I hadn’t even accepted that the story-worthy parts of my life had happened to me, much less dealt with the pain, shame and fear they inspired in me. Maybe I was hoping it would all pass.

Now I write about parts of my life I struggle to tell my friends and loved ones, people I know well and care about, and have documented the good, the bad and the ugly of losing, gaining back and losing the combined weight of an obese English mastiff, both here on this blog and on stage with pictures that have run the spectrum of audience reactions, from deep chortles to walking out in disgust. Also, someone cried, someone else said you had no soul if you didn’t like it. (So there.)

Writing about my life has given me a sense of control over my own stories and has instilled a fearlessness in me, the most important element of nonfiction writers, that I never had before as a writer or a person. The stakes are higher, too, when writing about one’s life. The risk of exposing too much about yourself or someone else is almost as exciting–and painful–as the act of writing itself.

Through writing here and for “Fat Fuck,” I’ve learned–and said–all too much about myself, but most of all, I’ve learned one of the most cliche axioms of all can be true: never say never. I hate when people tell me that almost as much as I hate being wrong.

My album cover art.

Exactly a year ago today, I publicly accepted the challenge of running a 5K, pushed–to the edge of reason, a fatter Brian would claim–by a drunken email from Steve asking me to run one. Then, I could not confidently say I was a runner, unless what I was running towards was a couch, a meal or a bus bringing me closer to a couch and a meal. At the time, I had already lost 30 lbs., mainly by walking and Wii Fit-ing my ass off, but I wasn’t really fit, wasn’t someone who ran and had little muscle beyond what was required to shuffle around my almost 250-pound frame.

A year later, running no longer requires a flag checkered with pepperoni pizza and a finish line conveniently located beside a couch. What once inspired shame now feels like a necessity. When I put on those muddy sneakers and slap band-aids over my bloody nipples, I know I have accomplished something a new hole in a belt and a number on a scale can’t quite capture.

Since I began training for the 5K a year ago, I have lost almost another 50 lbs. and have gained an understanding of myself and an acceptance of my body that some people spend a lifetime of therapy, fad diets and yoga trying to reach. There’s still more ahead of me–I’m running more than 4 miles now and want to run another 5K, then a 10K in the next year, and ultimately, I want to get below 200 lbs. for the first time since I was in middle school.

But today, I want to enjoy what I’ve accomplished by looking back at the last year of posts, my greatest hits, and sharing them with you, a blog version of a mixtape, with short “liner notes” for each post because I always love reading those:

Brian with an I: Greatest Hits Volume 1.

Side A.– The “I Can’t Believe I’m Going to Run for Something Other Than the Bus”/ “Holy Shit! I’m Going to Be a Dad” Side

“That Vest Makes You Look So…Fat.” Steve is half-naked and alone in his apartment with me, but he will regret more that he agreed to run a 5K wearing a 50 lb. weight vest.

“A Post Wherein I Tell You More About My Nipples Than You May Want to Know” Training for the 5K has begun, and I have the bloody nipples to show for it. No pasties are used.

“The Day I Found Out Santa Claus is Real” This one’s about the first ultrasound, also my first post about the pregnancy. Vaginas deserve a Supporting Actress nomination for their role in this post’s performance.

“When Girl-on-Girl Goes Wrong” The slow realization that I am going to be a father crashes head-on into the growing understanding that I never had a father. Also, more vaginas.

“The Toilet Hates Me” Training for the 5K–shit is getting real. Graphic descriptions of my pained body included.

“Because ‘I Don’t Give a Shit What You Think’ Would Be Too Easy” My ridiculousness goes from unrecorded legend to blog post.

“Getting Over My Fears, One Step at a Time” Let the emotional evisceration begin!

“RWF: A Recap of the 5K” I ran and lived to tell about it. This is that.

Side B.–The “Holy Shit! I Ran a 5K!”/ “Holy Shit! I’m Still Becoming a Dad” Side

“I Really Hope My Baby’s Mama Doesn’t Beat Me Up for Posting This” Fear the pregnant for they do not care what you think!

“A Dick Thing to Do” My most-read post, one about circumcision. Also, the comments from all the foreskin-lovers are hilarious!

“How Running Gave Me Happiness” More emotional evisceration!

“#grownfolksproblems” About to turn 30, I continue the emotional gutting.

“99 Problems But a Baby Ain’t One” A reflection on the day of Sonny’s birth.

“On Being Content with Failure” I didn’t reach my weight loss goal but in failing I gained so much more.

“The Reveal-ations of Brian McGuigan” Because I hadn’t gutted myself in awhile and I was on a roll with these three prior posts. Also, some guy leaves a comment about my mother, I reply, and this becomes my third most-read post. People are still telling me that guy was an asshole.

“On Realizing People Believe in Me” My last post and one of my personal favorites. Of the emotional evisceration variety but with less bowel.

And now shouts-out, my other favorite part of the liner notes:

Album shout-outs almost always start with thanking God, but since I spend my Sundays between September and early February on the couch and not at church, I’ll start by thanking football, especially the New York Giants. Jaime, of course, my dick-punching queen. Sonny–keep smiling, little man. And Steve, whose drunk emails, most of which I don’t share on this blog, are inspiring. And, thank you, everyone, for following me on this journey over the last year. Volume 2 will be even better.

That's where all the magic happens, in my office just above the sign.

For almost the last decade of my life, I have served Seattle’s writing community in various roles at Richard Hugo House. I have scrubbed toilets and shoveled snow before slapping a button-up and sportscoat over my sweaty frame and introducing performances by local writers for whom I would have done just about anything if they had asked. I have pulled award-winning writers from the ledge of anxiety before sold-out readings, pumping them up with, “I invited you for a reason. Because I know you’re going to be great,” and I have had to level with some folks, too, like the brilliant teen poet with aspirations to be the next Kerouac, whom I told, “Partying will always be there, but if you want to be a writer, you have to make the time for reading and writing.” Some days I feel like a therapist for writers and others like a hitman, picking off letters of recommendation, proposals for events and emails of gratitude with a single clip.

That is my job.

But, as a writer, I have often found myself at a crossroads with my work at Hugo House, supporting so many other writers that I have neglected my own, spending hours in the office and out, working well over the typical 40, creating successful programs while forgetting that I am a writer, too. For three years, when I first went full-time (If you’ve ever worked at a nonprofit, you know full-time basically means you’ve surrendered most of your waking life.), I didn’t write at all. Most nights, in those early years, I’d come home after an inspiring reading and want to stroke those keys, but was too exhausted and worn. When you work with words all day, writing and reading can seem like more toil than pleasure. I lost sight of the joy I found in discovering that powerful image hidden within something crappy I wrote on the bus or rereading part of a book because the writing was so good. I even thought about quitting writing altogether. Maybe I found my calling; maybe I was just an arts administrator.

It wasn’t until a couple of years ago when I finally hit my stride as a writer after Cienna Madrid, who’s a reporter for The Stranger and was a writer-in-residence at Hugo House, invited me to write something and pair it with a slideshow for a gig she was producing at Central Cinema. That’s when I debuted the earliest pieces of “Fat Fuck” with little intention of doing more with it, at first. Later that year, my dear friend and little sister, Kate Lebo, invited me to write something about pie and read it at her book launch, which turned into a personal essay about my childhood love of Ninja Turtle Pies and stealing. Performing more “Fat Fuck” at Bumbershoot followed and more inquiries to read and perform would come. Then, I was shortlisted for The Stranger Genius Award in Literature, and although it was for my work, and not my writing, the recognition motivated me further. I wanted to win that award–and the sheet cake that comes with it!–but knew, like everything else, it would require hard work, determination and, of course, writing, which I’ve done more of over the last two years than ever before.

Maybe it wasn’t working at Hugo House that was stopping me–I just hadn’t quite discovered the story I needed to tell, the one I wanted so badly to keep from everyone, though all it took was one look at me to see I was a fat fuck. (In the time between then and when I first began working at Hugo House, I had gained 80 lbs., and while only one person remarked on my weight gain, an unnamed–for now!–editor with a reputation for rudeness, I could tell from the looks in peoples’ eyes that they were surprised by my size.)

Telling this story has been immensely powerful for me personally as well as for my readers and audience members who, after learning about how I was bullied, how I hated myself, how Haagan-Dazs was my best friend, have wanted to share their secrets, their pains, too. The self-discovery I’ve undertaken through writing “Fat Fuck” and this blog is a treasure hunt where the Xs only lead to more maps of the uncharted lands of my psyche, my heart. While my waist line has shrunk, my understanding of myself and my addiction has grown, not to mention that word count, increasing, like the number on the scale has decreased, almost daily.

Which is why, two years after I first dipped into the old shoeboxes and scrapbooks for relics of my fattest years, those days when dinner was a well-worn bridge between two pints of ice cream, scrapping together pictures for a slideshow that would detail visually the cross I carried since grade school, splintered with slices of pizza and two-liters of Sunkist, I’m proud of how this one project steamrolled into a one-man show, so many blog posts and what I hope will eventually be a book.

But more than that–I’ve learned that people actually believe in me, this kid from Queens, who didn’t think he’d amount to much of anything.

They really like me!

I came to this realization just this week when Sarah, a client services rep at Golden Lasso, a marketing/design firm on Capitol Hill that has graciously offered to develop the branding and visual concepts for “Fat Fuck,” plus use of their space for a performance on April 19 (More details to come!), sent me a Schedule and Creative Brief, an email I forwarded to my wife immediately with “I HAVE A DESIGN TEAM!!!!!!!!!!” (Yes, in all caps with 10 exclamation points.) in the body of the message. Golden Lasso believes in my work and from the Creative Brief, I could tell immediately that they get me, something I was worried about because, after all, my show is called “Fat Fuck” and includes pictures of hemorrhoids, nipples and half-naked men. Sarah alleviated those concerns when she confessed, “We’re all happy we can say the word ‘fuck’ around the office now.”

I guess I should have known before, but as someone wrought with self-doubt, I haven’t always believed in myself, so having people believe in me, much less a design firm, comes as a surprise and inspires me to work even harder. The 4Culture grant I received last year helped, too, as well as seeing the writers I’ve supported during my career at Hugo House rally around me–like Keri Healey, who’s out of the blue Facebook message in late 2010 turned into her being my director (4Culture money well-spent!); Suzanne Morrison, who, if she wasn’t already working on her own book, could be my publicist with the way she toots her horn for me; Nicole Hardy, who constantly asks about my nipples; Marya Sea Kaminski, who, in a performance class four years ago, told me, “Don’t be afraid to make your audience uncomfortable,” and has stuck by me ever since; and so many of my close friends, Steve, Elissa, David, Ross, etc., reading, keeping tabs on me, encouraging me. It has all helped me understand why I do what I do. Supporting someone chasing their dreams can be almost as fulfilling as chasing your own.

I’m still not done yet. There’s more writing to come, more Xs to uncover leading to more maps, more self-discovery, more pain and certainly more failure, but, as a writer, I truly feel the support of a community that I’ve devoted so much of my life to as an arts administrator.

I’m glad to be one of you now.