The Person I'm Next To Is One With His Tamale

I'm next to this guy who is sitting in front of a styrofoam plate of tamales, under the coiled Christmas lights of a food truck's tent. He's here by himself, aside from the four tamale friends that he has briefly found. He's "not a small man," which is my polite way of saying that he is quite fat. He's shaped like a wide diamond. Aside from the protrusions you would expect from him being both human and male, he'd form a pretty good triangle if you folded him hamburger style.

But this is about tamales, not hamburgers.

He is eating his tamales slowly with the care and grace of someone basking in a rare moment of transcendence. There's a hint of something else, too--as if he's taking care to avoid a catastrophic misstep. The mix is about four parts "that feeling of slowly lowering yourself into a perfect bath," one part "action hero figuring out the color scheme of timebomb wires."

After each bite, he closes his eyes and quietly chews. He has just the slightest smile at his mouth when he does this. At first, I assume he is trying to seem like some badass zen tamale guy who doesn't give a fuck how much people see him enjoying his tamale. But I think it's actually sincere--I think he is almost meditating through his tamales.

I am also sitting next to my friend, and we are having a conversation. We are the only two people sitting near this man, and the volume of our conversation is probably forcing him into eavesdropping. If I were in his seat, I would be listening in. Food is somewhat boring, and people are interesting, even if their conversations sometimes aren't. But every time I look over his way, his attention is clearly tamale-centric. Bite goes in, eyes close, teeth move, food disappears, eyes open to line up the next forkful. My instinct is to make fun of this guy--an obese man sincerely eating tamales by himself under the Christmas lights of a plastic tent. But it would only make me feel a fraction of the enjoyment that he is feeling right now. I continue my conversation, and leave him to his.

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