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Fat was only in my mind in the fourth grade when the school nurse announced my weight aloud for everyone to hear. I decided that day that I was fat. That day was the beginning of my life long struggle with fat which took turns jumping from my head to actually being on my body and back again over and over. I began to live out my fourth grade self-prophesy.
Dessert was the best part of the meal. With five siblings it was tough to get extra but I managed to make that happen. I gained an interest in helping with the cooking because there was more of a chance to lick the bowl. In high school and early adulthood I tried the fad diets, doctors, and pills.
I know how it feels to not be able to stop myself. I know what it’s like to hide my eating habits, to eat before, during and after a party, to ask for reminders and help and then be angry when the very person from whom I requested help – does so. I know what it’s like to sneak food, to be stuffed and in pain, and to force more food down to my own self-disgust and amazement. I know what it feels like to think less of myself because I had no control, to be disappointed in myself, to be angry at thin people, to want to go out and leave my body at home. I had to lie down on the bed to zip up my jeans. I had bruises on my hip bones from them being too tight, and I’d cry because nothing fit anymore. I judged others and compared myself. My mantra waffled between, “At least I’m not that bad.” or “I wish I looked like her.”
My desperate nightly prayers were asking God to change the laws of the universe for me. I begged for help, but I actually wanted to eat whatever I wished without the consequences.
Face the fat. (I can’t.)
Abhor the fat. (I’ll never go out in public again, unless it is a drive-up or grocery store.)
Teased about the fat. (That hurts.)
Fuss with the fat. (Nothing fits.)
Answers for the fat. (Must be my thyroid.)
Tents hide the fat. (Good try.)
Frustrated with the fat. (Diets never work for me.)
Accumulate more fat. (It’s because of the Holidays.)
Try a new scale. (This one doesn’t work right either.)
Forgive the fat. (I’m too angry.)
Adore the fat. (Fat chance in hell.)
Transform the fat to muscle. (I’m already tired.)
Today my prayers have changed. The mantra has become one of gratitude. The fat has dropped away and has made room for a life without the obsession. Desserts, sugar and flour no longer hold me prisoner. Today I do not feel deprived. I know that I simply had my share early on and in fact I probably have had my share for more than one life time.
Freedom from the obsession has opened up hours in my day to be my true self, to be present with others and to enjoy many lovely relationships.
Hovering the edge of society
Some wonder at my strange sobriety.
Fasting from some foods aids my deepest search
For Thy Holy Grail not found in any church
Of wood or stone but in the wind of Thee.
The refreshing approaching breeze of spring
And angels breath inspires me to sing.
Judy Safford 2/24/09
Fat
by Gerald Blake Storrow
The Storrows were an ectomorphic clan
So weight had little interest for me while growing up
And even less today. But I’ve a friend for whom
Fat’s always been a bugaboo, and this despite the fact
That by comparison I’m positively plump
But that is by the bye. The largest body in my youth
Was Catherine’s, our maid, our cook, and she
Who offered us what warmth there was
Beneath our roof, and so, if anything
I had a predilection for weight. She came
From County Cork, and saved me Irish stamps,
And bought occasionally a comic book or two
That she would leave beneath my pillow,
And I would sneak barefoot down the hall
While Mum and Dad would try
to entertain their wits below
To see her in her room. She saved, I think,
What life I had while I was there
That had to feel its way
To where a heart might be
NANCY SLONIM ARONIE – FAT
What I remember most about the fights between my sister and my father were the negotiations; his pleading ‘I’ll buy you a cashmere sweater set if you lose fifteen pounds.’ I remember her face longing for the prize and her attitude, defeated before she began. It didn’t occur to me then but years later when I was shopping for more cashmere than any one person should own that I had been skinny then and the injustice of her getting the reward if she would just make him proud and me already at the goal he had set for her but not being noticed, seemed to connect the emotional dots in a way I had never done before. When he died I was fifteen and strangely, maybe not so strangely, I put on about 20 pounds. Maybe if I were fat he would come back and bargain with me. I wasn’t ever really fat. Pictures win out that argument but it counts if you feel fat. By college I weighed 190. I used to make jokes while flipping the loose underarm flab; “There’s just no tone in my family,” I’d quip drawing attention to my shortcoming. That way, I must have rationalized, if I named it before they did, then they couldn’t use it against me. How I knew such a strategy is beyond me. But it worked. Nobody thought I was fat. They just thought I was funny.
But Saturday nights at Mary Washington College of the University of Virginia while everyone was primping in crinolines and crepe, I was watching from my narrow bed in my dungarees and over sized men’s white oxford shirt and yearning, had no humor at all. Over the loud speaker the dripping with honey southern matron’s voice, the Housemother, would say Marabeth Wilson or TJ Hale or LouAnne Lynch ,you have a gentlemen calluh in the parluh. How I wished it were me. But I was fat jewish and funny and in 1959 in what seemed like the deep south, no one was interested in fat jewish and funny.
In my early twenties I found I could actually change my body by doing physical exercises. I started running. There weren’t many folks jogging then and it was the beginning of a whole new world for me. My calves tightened, my inner thighs no longer rubbed together and my joy at taking charge zoomed my soul through the stratosphere. I felt beautiful. In photos now I see I actually was beautiful. But the scars of yesteryear remain. Weight had always been in the equation , the measuring stick for my happiness and my self esteem.
I have stayed thin for lo these many years. What I notice over the last decades is how the whole culture has become obsessed with weight. And what I also notice is how thin, women have become. I have been in a room full of intelligent interesting excessively tiny stick figured girls and when an overweight contemporary walks out of the room someone invariably says, “Wow! Sandra has gained lot of weight, did you notice?” I had noticed but since I knew the pain of overweight -ness I would say something like, “She looks so great in red doesn’t she?” I don’t take credit for being the nice one, just the one who still carried the wound, probably thinking, I’m next. Never gain weight and never leave the room first.
It’s been ages since I have cared that much or obsessed that much over extra pounds. I use heavy cream in my coffee and never turn down a hot fudge sundae. I am well aware of all the news stories about the rise of obesity in America. I don’t worry about horizontal stripes anymore or pastel colors. “Does this make me look fat?” has been out of my vocabulary for eons. So the other day I had an interesting
experience.
I needed to use a bathroom and the only building in sight was one of those Hampton Inn type places. I was practically running thru the door rehearsing my admission that I am not checking in or a guest but could I please use the bathroom. At the same time I was fervently hoping I could just slide in unnoticed and sneak into the ladies. The first person I saw was the receptionist and I knew I had to communicate. I said, “I’m desperate can I use your ladies room?” He couldn’t have been more gracious. And he couldn’t have been more rotund. While sitting on the throne I had so much appreciation for his kindness, I started thinking about his ability to be nice. I imagined all the slings and arrows he had probably had to defect in his life with all that extra weight. And I had a funny thought. What if thin people started to be the outcasts? What if people looked at them as if they were sickly and wasting away? What if the definition of attractive changed? And a paradigm shift occurred and fat became in?
I’m still at the “what if” stage. But I do know that corn starch and corn syrup and corn everything are used in prepackaged food and people who don’t have lots of money or nutrition education will continue to eat corn based foods. In the mean time I wont judge or care about anyone elses body. Just give me the ok when I come running in desperate and you will always be gorgeous to me.
If you’re happy and you know it, clap your feet. If you’re happy and you know it clap your feet. A toothless grin looks up at me and I’m in love. I silently apologize for how confused you’re going to be when you learn the correct words to these songs. I wonder when the last time was that I was so flexible I actually could clap my feet together. I was probably five months old, too.
They are soft, perfect, too small for shoes and their prints are etched permanently on my heart. I have become one of those people I used to make fun of. I show your picture to any stranger who will look. They politely nod and smile at how adorable you are.
How much longer will it be before you are walking? My heart is telling me you’ll probably go straight to running. Your father and I have a lot of childproofing to do! I think of the first time you’ll dance, the first sand between those tiny toes, and the first time you’ll look down and see grass beneath your feet. We walk this journey together, you and I, for such a short while and it scares me. Now that you’re here I am no longer the child. Time flies much too quickly and before I know it, I’ll be in my mother’s place. It is just a part of life, I know but I will be sad to let go of our time together.
I am trying to leave you details of these days; the lessons, the mistakes, and the footprint I would like to leave behind. Your life is my fresh snowfall, my second chance. I get to rediscover today when I see you smile at each new morning. You greet each day like the gift I’ve lost sight of. Your heart has not been trampled by a to-do list, a career, bills and grown up notions on how to behave. You are so much more than a reminder of my mortality. You are the living embodiment of my love for my spouse and proof that life goes on in the face of tragedy. The best opportunity to remember how to appreciate life is now living in my home, ready to explore.
Happy Valentine’s Day to my baby girl from mommy and daddy. Right here, right now, we are happy and we know it.
It is the language of our feet that has sustained our marriage.
The soles of his wide Size 12’s are calloused and capable, the solid roots of an oak tree. But the tops of my husband’s feet show his sweet side, fair-skinned and tender. My bony Size 7’s are rough most of the time from too many barefoot days, and if the toes are polished, the same coat has probably been there for several months. But throughout our twenty-four years together, the soft upper side of his foot has reached over to the rough underside of mine in bed each night, pushing gently as we drift off to sleep. My foot pushes back against his, an answering pressure that says, without need of words, “I am here. You are mine. Thank you, God.” I inhale connection, breathe out gratitude, and sleep more sweetly.
This one movement, this foot touching foot, has sometimes been the only way we could reach each other. In times of alienation, it might be the only contact we had for days. But my heart rested more easily at night when, despite the distance between us, despite the failure of words, our feet were still talking. And when there is no darkness between us but exhaustion keeps us apart, his foot reminds me that he is still there. I don’t even have to open my eyes as I let him know that I am glad.
Cissy White – Dancing with the Beach
Size 10 and triple E. Substantial. That’s me. Large as my feet are they still manage, in parts, to be bony. Though bony, they are bulbous and fleshy and easy to bruise. My pinky toe is an unwanted child squished into family photos. She plays half size just to belong but is damaged with broken nails and misshapen with the effort of trying to fit in.
Still, since age 40, I adore my feet. At the ocean, they are exquisite dance partners. I can follow without lead. The rocks and sand underneath hold me as gingerly as a little girl with a loving Daddy who lets me step on him and then carries.
I hunt sea glass not with my hands or my eyes but my feet. My back is to the water. I feel the wind on my back and let the moisture sneak up and over my shoulders. My feet track the tide, tell me where we will hunt and I follow.
In soft soled sneakers I can feel the rocks underneath. I tend to stand still and move backwards. I look towards the shore instead of the water. I am with the salty sandy earth. Only occasionally do I let a strong wave cut in, turning my attention to the stunning sky line, the clouds hovering above in animal shapes. I try not to get distracted with the commuter boat, wondering where people are going, try not to think of wind energy with the turbine turning in Hulll. I breathe up the smell, the sea weed and fish and turn toward the ground, and walk happy with eyes cast down.
When I hunt alone I stretch and dance. I am unselfconscious of eyes in homes or people in boats. I can’t see them and am engrossed, like a practitioner doing Tai Chi. I have my own ritual. First, I stand tall and stretch up to the sun and sky. Then, I put hair in pony tail; stick Ziploc baggies in back pockets. I am an athlete in warm up.
When it is time, the music of waves, in random rhythms move me. I hinge at the waist and bend. My flat back parallel to the ground, my hands could but do not reach down. They rest on my back as my gaze floats over the ground. In this posture, I am half in meditation and half a speed skater. I never “touch down” without intention. When the sand offers up a gem that says “Rescue me,” I palm it. I rub and remove sand and holding it as if to say, “There. There,” before homing her in a bag, a guppy waiting to join the other fish in the tank.
My feet slide to the left, hop to the back, take me diagonal over rocks. I follow wherever they track. Sometimes, I go in a circle marking a boundary around a scared space knowing something waits. It is not always sea glass, a heart-shaped rock, or even pottery but an insight or a feeling. I know when I have found it as my feet will move me along.
It is not a private place. People, mostly men walk with dogs and binoculars and fishing poles come too. I do not rise to meet them. I wave, pet the dogs curious enough to bound over. I am loyal to the song and the ground. The beach, though rocky, is always solid thanks to my triple E width, size 10 feet who have helped me learn to move into stillness.
I think the ocean is also happy to see me. A less delicate looking polished set of bare foot would not hold the sturdy ocean in her toes. I, when the beach is tired, can lift her up and let her rest. When she is dirty, I pick up the litter and debris of others. I am graced with gems but will return favors. I am loving and loyal and grateful for these feet.
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