aphysicality
Trees are edges. Sundays I spend with my two daughters. A favourite ritual (of mine) is the trip to Tesco's cafe where we each choose breakfast from the array of things on offer, modelling all kinds of interesting decision-making challenges.

Last Sunday I found myself waiting in line behind a large number of people at varying stages of terminal obesity. I watched them taking turns handing the plates back and forth until they were literally piled high with fried food: suasages, fried eggs, fried bread, bacon, hash browns, beans, black pudding...

Uncharacteristically, I felt a wave of fury washing over me. I stood there, wondering why. Perhaps I was getting old.

The most likely explanation seemed to be that I was experiencing that detestable form of sanctimonious rationalisation that affects people whose self-belief rests on the pride they take in their 'life decisions' - non-smokers, for example (you know the type: 'how dare you force me to breathe your smoke, etc.).

Another possibility was that this was simply a transference of my impatience, in turn a symptom of AADD (adult attention deficit disorder) brought on by a lifestyle in which every second wasted is time lost keeping pace with emails.

Moving upwards on the scale of self-acceptability, it was just possible the image of gross over-consumption and avarice triggered those sentiments towards everything that is bad about Western culture - compounded by the complicity of large corporations - such as Tesco's - acting without a hint of social responsibility. I toyed with the idea of suggesting to the cafeteria that they introduce a policy of limiting the number of fried foodstuffs to two for people who are clearly eating themselves into an early grave.

This morning I considered another explanation: I have been reading John Gray's philosophical work 'Straw Dogs' (nothing to do with the movie). It occurred to me that obesity is merely symptomatic of a more profound turn in human progress - namely that the body is becoming obsolete; we are becoming increasingly aphysical creatures. It seemed to me that we are essentially striving (and succeeding) to sever our links with the physical world - mirroring a familiar religious denial of the physical world of sin and suffering. If this sounds implausible, consider how many people now spend their time: they drive to work, at work they immediately interface directly with the world of information via email and the web and the phone. All they do is sit. They drive home. At home the virtual worlds of hollywood and video games are piped into their houses. Perhaps they now also work from home. A body is merely baggage. They play golf on their phones.

For Western societies it seems clear that we are indeed striving to marginalise the physical and to migrate to the virtual (so much more amenable) leaving the needy, cumbersome physical form behind. Who cares what happens to our bodies? 'Give us a pill that keeps it all in shape and let us get on with our lives'. The movement is a triumphant one - a transmigration, almost an ascension to heaven - finally we leave the physical world behind. Obesity is symptomatic of a curious kind of liberation, a dark departure and victory.
But trees are edges, and they will remain.