A Man And His Snacks...

By DUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
The Paz Files

AUSTIN, Texas - As I write today's story, this one, there is a bag of animal crackers just to the left of my laptop. In front, in the cubby holes of my antique desk are three candy bars: a 3 Musketeers, a PayDay and a Hershey's almond. Next to that are my fruit adventure tic tacs, and alongside that four small boxes of Sun Maid raisins. Behind me, on a small carved-wood coffee table is a bottle of my beloved Shiraz wine, there in front of my fold-out futon. Off to the side, on a bookshelf, rests a bottle of Johnny Walker Red. In the small trash can alongside my desk is a bag that once held a healthy amount of walnuts.

It's my day's fuel, what I need to get work done.

Snacks, from nuts to fruit to ice cream to cookies, set the tone for my mornings. I couldn't get crap done without any of them. And, aside from my sleep, it is my work on here that rounds out my days these days. You could say I'm a lucky guy. I reach inside my animal crackers bag and draw a zebra, a monkey, a buffalo and a hippo. Tasty stuff! Hmmmmm.

So, what is it about snacks and the human experience? Most people think they are bad for you, that too many sugar cookies equal too much sugar and that too much sugar leads to horrible things such as diabetes and iron-poor blood. Who knows? I've been a champion snacker all of my life, and, well, I seem to be okay, still full of energy and still wishing to raise Hell.

A trusted college friend once told me to eat raisins instead of candy, but then another friend told me that raisins contain a lot of sugar. Same for Ketchup; it has little tomato but a load of sugars. Blueberries also find their way to my desk, sometimes in vanilla ice cream, with walnuts just because. I find it a super snack. Throw in a good story to write and, honeybuns, don't bug me until dinner is served.

I think it started when I was a kid. My early years - one to 10 - were largely awful years during which I often was sick of something or another. My hospital record still lives somewhere with lengthy notations about serious stuff and semi-serious moments. Conversely, my adult years have been relatively free of illness, other than a horrible episode with my kidneys in the 1990s that led to an operation. I remember it well. When I asked my doctor if any ideas of penis enlargement had gone out the window, he said, "No, you still have one good kidney, and most people can live a healthy life with that one, if you take care of yourself." I never did enlarge it; it's more than I probably deserved.

Yeah, being human is living a flawed existence. You get X-amount of years and then comes the exit, often without grace. I hate my skeleton, but that's a story my friends and family have grown weary of hearing from me. The entire body operation is woeful, from the two-lung design to the essence of bowels. You'd think the creator would have had a better final product. The human body is a failed experiment; it is akin to throwaway consumer products -organs with a short shelf life and a bag to be utilized while alive, but to be disposed of when the time comes. I used to use a phrase that said most bad people are nothing but "skin and seven holes," when annoyed. It's true, but we rarely look at our bodies as anything other than either handsome or pretty or ugly and eccentric.

Dietitians will tell you that some things you eat can make you ugly. To much cheese, is what I say, but some of these people scoff at that. Alcohol is bad for the skin. Tamales will bulk you up faster than a pregnancy bulks-up women. The intestines are fragile personalities. They hate the idea of menudo, cause those, too, are someone else's intestines. I hate menudo, as much as I hate casseroles and porridge. Feet hate dirt. Arms and legs seem sad. The poor ass is, except for rare moments, wholly utilitarian, like a sewer line. But it's also true that you can make yourself sick wondering about foods and the good and bad in them.

I'm sticking with my animal crackers...

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