I've been thinking a lot about the differences in people, why they exist, and what is our role in judging them.
My conclusion is: we have no role, unless we are serving on a jury of their peers. And even then... well, that's   a subject for another day.

Stephen Hawkins created quite a controversy in his book "The Grand Design" when he stated that there is no god, that we are basically the results of a chemical reaction, an accident of nature of sorts. I don't pretend to have all the answers to the universe, but I must agree that the human mind does operate on chemistry.

Love, hate, depression, anxiety...it is all a matter of a chemical reaction in the brain. Craving a sweet? A cigarette? Sex? That's because the pleasure center in your brain is begging to be triggered. What triggers it is different for everyone, a single thing, or a particular combination.

So, you look at the fat man using the electric wheelchair at Walmart and you think, "Oh my God, what is wrong with that man? Why doesn't he go on a diet?"

Well, first of all, maybe he has. Maybe it hasn't worked for him, or other health issues are preventing him from exercising enough to drop the pounds. Or maybe he has already lost a hundred pounds, and only now is strong enough to get out at all. OR... maybe he simply doesn't want to. Maybe he gets so much joy from the foods that he eats that giving them up simply makes life seem too bleak.

Do you think that's sick? Well, maybe he looks at people jogging down the road and secretly thinks "That's crazy. Who would subject themselves to such pain and torture?" Yet those people jogging may be getting the same joy from the chemicals coursing through their brains as that fat man gets from eating a carton of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Who says which is the right course?

The answer to that is: society, social mores driven by the media. All I'm saying is, try looking to yourself for an opinion. And then keep it to yourself.

Oh, you say, but the jogger will have a more fulfilling and longer life. Really? For one thing, joggers drop dead unexpectedly from heart attacks every day. For another, just because a man looks fit and happy, you don't know that he is. Maybe his family hates him because he spends all his time jogging; maybe he's a philanderer or a pedophile or even a serial killer... there is no way to know all the secret places of a person's mind. No one is that good at chemistry.

And so what if the fat man lives twenty fewer years? Maybe that is exactly how many years he wants to live. And maybe he will live them very happily... which he might not do if he spends his days depriving himself of that which brings him joy.

It's a matter of quality, not quantity, folks. Believe me, I see it in my elderly clients all the time. They give up this and that to live longer, and often they do, well into their nineties, but just as often they tell me every day how much they miss those things they gave up. Smoking, drinking, pastries... yes, even sex.

Now, I'm not saying throw caution to the wind and go have sex with forty different partners while on a drunken bender, smoking unfiltered Pall Malls and munching chocolate eclairs. I'm just saying, maybe you don't want to give up ALL your vices.

And maybe some people don't want to give up any.

Me, I like to smoke and have the occasional beer. I like to write and read and drink way too much coffee while standing under the stars on a chilly morning. Not everyone likes those things, and yes, I know some of it will shorten my days on this earth. But my brain chemistry responds well to it, and I am a happy person.

Now, you over there, spending an hour on the elliptical machine every night after work and drinking raw carrot juice... I don't get that at all. But hey, it isn't my place to judge you... I just hope it is your bliss, and not something you do because you think you should.

On my death bed, I will look back on all that wonderful coffee I drank under the stars while enjoying my morning cigarette... and I will smile as the lights blink off.