I got a chance to mingle with some fellow humans today, which is a rare enough occurrence these days. I spent several hours hanging around the garage sale at Suzanne's house, doing what little I could to help. I didn't have anything to sell this time around, but I helped keep track of the kids while their mothers sold off their old clothes and toys. (Sounds kind of mercenary when it's put like that, doesn't it?) And I helped drag the stuff under cover when the rain started. The bad weather held off for most of the day, and most of the action was in the morning, so everyone felt the sale was a success.

Too eager for spring to be here, I arrived at the garage sale in spring attire, jeans and my Cabo San Lucas T-shirt (never been there, but I like the shirt). The sky was gray, but I was hopeful. Then it got colder. Then it started to rain. Then it poured for the rest of the afternoon. When I finally realized that it wasn't going to get any better, I dashed through the downpour to my car and headed home. I ate a big bowl of vegetable soup and fell asleep on the couch for a couple of hours. It seemed like the right way to spend a rainy Saturday evening.

The little ones were lively and entertaining, as usual. They were drawing pictures when I arrived, and I came home with several new adornments for my refrigerator door. The first cherry blossoms decorated the tree in front of the house next door, and somehow the kids got the idea that the adults should be bestowed with gifts of flowers. Fortunately, they're all short (there were four of them, the oldest barely six), so only a few branches very close to the ground were denuded before they grew tired of that adventure and went on to something else.

And I got to hold the baby, so all in all it was a wonderful day. If only it really were spring, it would have been perfect.

For the last few years, I thought I was at the weight where I'd stay for the rest of my life. I could not get under 160 and was often closer to 165, and I am not nearly tall enough or broad enough to carry that much weight. When I started my diet six weeks ago I weighed 161. Today I am at 151. It's sort of miraculous to me, to be going in the right direction for a change, staying the course and getting closer to a goal. If I were very ambitious, I'd head for 140, but I'd be thrilled to make it to 145. Thrilled. I'm already thrilled, in truth, to have lost ten pounds.

The first time I went on the Slim-Fast diet, about a dozen years ago, I weighed a staggering 175. I was sitting in the Oakland Coliseum Arena before a Warrior basketball game, waiting for my friend Barry to show up, when I first felt the roll of blubber around my middle as an entity unto itself. It was physically uncomfortable for me to sit in the seat, and the more I thought about it the worse it seemed.

I never looked back. I lost seven pounds the first week and never saw 175 again. I got down to 140 and stayed there a while before creeping back up to 150. That was okay, and I maintained that weight for several years. Three or four years ago, around holiday time, I went berserk. Stopped caring about what I ate or how much I exercised and added those ten pounds that have been so hard to lose.

Now that I'm back on track, I intend to stay there. That's easy to say, I know, but life is so much better when you can sit down without feeling as if an extra person has just flopped onto your lap out of nowhere. That's what got me started dieting again, and remembering it is what will keep me going.