Last night, I attended a family party - a 50th wedding anniversary party. One thoughtful family member took all of the footage from the old video cameras and put them on a DVD. We watched the videos loop on the screen for some time. All of the old footage was from the 70s and very early 80s.

All but two were thin - almost too thin, by today's standards. And the two that weren't wouldn't stick out today as being "fat", but more like "slightly chubby."

Watching this with the backdrop of those same people, all ballooned out into obese bodies, riddled with health problems was really eye-opening. I caught a few glimpses of my grandmother in the video - she collapsed and died of a heart attack at age 48 - she was about a size 14. She was the heaviest of the bunch. In contrast, I have two aunts that haven't seen below 325 since the early 90s and another who has always been about 250. The rest hop around in the 180-220 range. Not a single one of them shops outside of the plus-sized ladies
department.

My father and my uncles were stick-thin in the video and only one at this point in time qualifies as merely overweight... the rest are obese. This is not all genetic; these include the wives/husbands of all 8 of the siblings.

I saw my mother, pregnant for me, saunter in front of the camera in a thin body. (I myself have never even approached such a thin body.) I saw my aunts laze around in bikinis - in bikini bodies. This is in stark contrast to now. And yes, they are all much, much older, but even glancing at all of the cousins - even the ones who are in this young age group - only one looked even remotely close in thinness to all the women on the video. The rest of us are straight-up obese.

In the videos, the family parties looked identical to what we had last night, with only minor changes.

In 1973, the guys drank copious amounts of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Last night, the beers didn't flow as freely as they used to, but I did see a few uncles who had a Light beer in hand.

In 1973, Aunt Kathy made her famous potato salad with real mayo. Last night, she made the sort with low-fat Miracle Whip. Same bowl as 1973. The plates were heaping with the stuff the same last night as they were in 1973.

In 1973, everyone showed off their fingers, dripping in bbq sauce, to the cameras while licking them off. Last night, I saw the same people eating the same food. The only difference was that in 1973, everyone was eating legs. Last night, everyone had chicken breasts.

It was amazing to compare the then and the now with the same people, under similar circumstances.