It is not easy to find a visual representation of a lack of something. That is why Sartre book covers are so boring.

I have always been, as they say, a good eater, but I never thought that it was at the core of my being. Now I’m not so sure.

Certainly I have had the flu many times before, and while it’s always awful, I’m usually so nauseous that I don’t have the time to pause and reflect upon my lack of appetite. What happened on Sunday and Monday was different. I didn’t feel sick to my stomach (though that came later—a virus, maybe, or a latent Mexican souvenir), but I simply wasn’t hungry. It was startling. I’m almost always hungry. In the abstract, that doesn’t sound so bad (it sounds more like an ideal diet), but I’m not exaggerating when I say that I was completely unsettled by it. I wandered around aimlessly on my lunch break, confused by this sudden non-wanting. It was as though a thrumming engine that is always purring inside of me had dropped away. It was almost a relief when I started feeling ill; a presence rather than an absence.

Perhaps you find it silly or frivolous that I am equating a greedy desire for food with a cherished personality trait. But aren’t we all, to some extent, defined by our wants? They’re the heartbeats beneath our most vital decisions: this person or that person, Cleveland Indians or Cincinnati Reds, drama club or football team, crunchy or creamy. Continue reading →