But Don’t Think I’m So Enlightened as To Be Unafraid of Holiday Weight Gain

I never really liked Jennifer Love Hewitt much, possibly because I thought Sara was too blah for Bailey, and possibly because I couldn’t stomach the way in which every article about her mentioned that she was called “Love” by her friends, but lately, for the most part, I’ve been ambivalent towards her. I think she is really pretty, I question why Hanes picked her to be in their ads, I think she has a cute smile and a pointy chin and shiny hair and beyond that, Whatevs.  Until she was all, Yeah, so what if my ass isn’t perfect, I’m having a fine time and so should y’all, and then I fell in love with her, because I’m pretty sure she would be way more fun to have brunch with than any number of generic macrobiotic Hollywood bitches.  She’d eat corned beef hash with poached eggs and have a Bloody Mary, I bet, and in case you were wondering, that is basically my perfect brunch meal, unless there happens to be an entire trough full of cinnamon rolls (sans icing), muffins, bagels, donuts and toast – lots and lots of toast – because I likes me some carbs in the a.m.

And now let me address my own ass and thighs:  a friend at work keeps telling me that she’s jealous because I’ve been losing weight (not that much) and I recently ran into another friend who was all, You look really good…and both of those things are nice to hear, and I’m not going to lie and tell you that I’m not thrilled to have lost (a small amount of) weight, but weight and size – and the constant moderation thereof – have been such a part of my adult life that I feel strangely guilty over this recent weight loss (and again, NOT THAT MUCH, I’ve gone down a size, if that) because I haven’t been trying to lose weight; rather, I’ve just been really anxious, and I’ve been drinking less.  So there is the secret: drink less, and go through a few shitty months.  Thank you, I’ll take my Why Depressed Teetotalers Don’t Get Fat book deal advance now.

But seriously, I know logically that I’m not fat, and haven’t ever really been fat, yet losing weight and struggling to find pants that fit has made me OBSESSIVE over the size of my ass/hips/belly/thighs and I’ve caught myself staring at my rear in the mirror thinking WHY ARE YOU SO FLAT, even though I should know by now that THIS – straight up and down with nary a curve – is my body, for better or worse, through thick and thin.  I will never be bootylicious.  No one will ever look at my ass and want to tap it.  Ever.  (They will want to tap MY SOUL!  They will want to bang MY INTELLECT senseless!)

I have no waist to speak of, my ass is flat, I am a B cup at best, I have thick legs and what can probably be considered cankles.  My right knee turns in and my right foot turns out and my elbows are hyper-extended and bend too far.  I have tiny earlobes and bony wrists and I wish my triceps and upper arms were smaller and more defined.  I will never be described as gamine.  Ever.  I’m 5′9″ and unless I develop a life threatening illness, I will never be called frail or gaunt or lithe or delicate or tiny or waif-like, all things that I am ashamed to admit would make me really really happy.  I’m thin enough, yes, but I’m also human and riddled with flaws and am still just learning how to take my flaws out for dinner and have a rousing good time, rather than thinking of ways to keep all those body parts hidden.  It’s a process.  And if I’m really really lucky, then maybe someday you all will see me and my pale ass in a tabloid, frolicking with my hot boyfriend or husband or inappropriately-aged fling in the waves, without a care in the world, ill-fitting bikini sliding down my pasty hips, because really, shouldn’t we all be so lucky?

Add comment December 6th, 2007

War on Terror, NY Post Style

Is it me, or is the cartoon dialogue bubble saying WARM UP THE VIRGINS! overkill?

(ETA that link is not working anymore and I cannot get the NY Post site to load at all, but Gawker was on it quicker/better/etc than me anyway…)

Add comment June 9th, 2006

Hot, Steamy Cowshit

I am boycotting the Oscars from here until eternity.

11 comments March 5th, 2006

Round Up

My friend Suzie is having an Oscar party on Sunday night, and though I generally prefer to watch awards shows from my couch, wearing sweats, with no competition for snide comments, Kent and I are going to Suzie’s.  It’s a fondue party, which is hard to pass up under any circumstances, and I haven’t seen Suzie in a while and she is awesome.  Melted cheese is awesome, the Oscars are awesome, making fun of famous people is awesome.  It’s going to be an awesome night.  Unless “Crash” wins Best Picture.  I think it’s part of Blog Law (cannot write that without thinking of Bob Loblaw and laughing to myself) that if you write online, you post some sort of list involving the movies nominated for awards.  I’m playing it straight this year, but look below for my handicap on the Academy Awards.  Except that I didn’t assign odds for any of the winners, so I guess my picks aren’t handicapped at all.  It’s just a list.  The end.   
 

Performance by an actor in a leading role:
Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Capote”
Terrence Howard in “Hustle & Flow”
Heath Ledger in “Brokeback Mountain”
Joaquin Phoenix in “Walk the Line” 
David Strathairn in “Good Night, and Good Luck.”
 
SHOULD WIN:    Heath Ledger.  Sigh.
WILL WIN:         Phillip Seymour
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:           
Jeff Daniels, “The Squid & The Whale” 
 

Performance by an actor in a supporting role:
George Clooney in “Syriana”
Matt Dillon in “Crash”
Paul Giamatti in “Cinderella Man”
Jake Gyllenhaal in “Brokeback Mountain”
William Hurt in “A History of Violence”
 
SHOULD WIN:    George Clooney
WILL WIN:         George Clooney
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:           
Everyone else in “Good Night, and Good Luck”
 
 

Performance by an actress in a leading role:
Judi Dench in “Mrs. Henderson Presents”
Felicity Huffman in “Transamerica”
Keira Knightley in “Pride & Prejudice” 
Charlize Theron in “North Country” 
Reese Witherspoon in “Walk the Line”
 
SHOULD WIN:    meh.
WILL WIN:         Reese Witherspoon
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:           
Radha Mitchell, “Melinda & Melinda”
  

Performance by an actress in a supporting role:
Amy Adams in “Junebug”
Catherine Keener in “Capote” 
Frances McDormand in “North Country” 
Rachel Weisz in “The Constant Gardener” 
Michelle Williams in “Brokeback Mountain”
 
SHOULD WIN:    Amy Adams
WILL WIN:         Rachel Weisz
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:           
Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Happy Endings”
(I think this is the most difficult category, actually…both of the supporting role categories were stronger than the lead roles this year, I think.  I thought Michelle Williams was astonishing in “Brokeback Mountain” and was 100% throwing my weight behind her, but then Amy Adams absolutely won me over.  Catherine Keener is fantastic and sexy and gets more fantastic and sexier every year – I would have actually nominated her for “The 40-Year Old Virgin,” though.  She held her own with all those boys, grounded the film, and turned it into the only real romantic comedy – funny!  And romantic!  Because Romantic Comedies are supposed to be FUNNY, Hollywood!  Not sappy! – I’ve seen in ages.)
  
 
Achievement in cinematography:
“Batman Begins”               
“Brokeback Mountain”
“Good Night, and Good Luck.”                                                            
“Memoirs of a Geisha”              
“The New World”
 
SHOULD WIN:    Brokeback Mountain
WILL WIN:         Brokeback Mountain
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:            Um…
 
 
Adapted screenplay:
“Brokeback Mountain” Screenplay by Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana            
“Capote” Screenplay by Dan Futterman
 ”The Constant Gardener” Screenplay by Jeffrey Caine
 ”A History of Violence” Screenplay by Josh Olson
 ”Munich” Screenplay by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth
 
SHOULD WIN:    Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
WILL WIN:         Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS:
“Sin City” by Frank Miller
 
 
Original screenplay:
“Crash” Screenplay by Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco, Story by Paul Haggis
 ”Good Night, and Good Luck.”  Screenplay by George Clooney & Grant Heslov
“Match Point” Written by Woody Allen
“The Squid and the Whale” Written by Noah Baumbach
 ”Syriana” Written by Stephen Gaghan
 
SHOULD WIN:    “Match Point” or “The Squid & The Whale” (I like movies about PEOPLE)
WILL WIN:         “Good Night & Good Luck” (which is totally fine with me because I loved this movie and in a year without “Brokeback Mountain” I would love to see it win the directing award because it was so tight and clean and clever and  focused, when so many movies are messy and sprawling.  I loved it.  But I love relationship drama more.)
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS: 
“Melinda & Melinda” written by Woody Allen. 
(It wasn’t a great movie, but it was a great concept and a great script and had a great performance by the gorgeous Radha Mitchell.  What I love about Woody Allen’s movies is that even when they are crap (and they can be total, utter crap), they are excellent at capturing a sense of place.  They are comforting to me, even when they are nothing but a bunch of neurotic vignettes strung together by a weak plot and a weaker cast.  “Melinda & Melinda” charmed me, and I thought the script was tight and clever.)
 

Achievement in directing:
“Brokeback Mountain”              
“Capote”
“Crash”
“Good Night, and Good Luck.”                                                         
 ”Munich”
 
SHOULD WIN:    Ang Lee, “Brokeback Mountain
WILL WIN:         Ang Lee, “Brokeback Mountain”
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS: 
Woody Allen, “Match Point”
 

Best motion picture of the year:
“Brokeback Mountain” 
“Capote” 
“Crash”               
“Good Night, and Good Luck.”   
“Munich”
 
SHOULD WIN:    Brokeback Mountain
WILL WIN:         Brokeback Mountain
TOTALLY JACKED ON THE NOMINATIONS: 
“Walk the Line”

Movies that I loved in 2005 include Happy Endings, Kung Fu Hustle, Sin City, Mad Hot Ballroom, The Squid & The Whale, Junebug, Brokeback Mountain, Walk the Line, Hustle & Flow, Good Night & Good Luck, Madagascar, Proof, The 40 Year Old Virgin and probably a few others I’m forgetting.  I’m pretty happy with the recognition most of them got throughout the awards season.  The only film I really can’t put my support behind is “Crash.”  It just didn’t do it for me.
 

10 comments February 28th, 2006

Milano

Wednesday, Train Station. We spring for first class this time on train to Milan – getting to Florence was such a disaster, got tickets but didn’t understand how to read them, didn’t realize there were assigned seats and twice sat in the wrong car and felt like total assholes entirely, especially since we were pissy, dirty, hungry from overnight flight and kept taking nice Italian peoples’ seats. So this time we upgraded – first class, which is much nicer than coach but also nicer because this time we have some semblance of what we are doing. We should end up in Milan around 2pm, and having dealt with the train station once before, I feel much better about this leg of our travel. I feel kind of bad as we pull out of Florence – I’m not sure we were the best travelers. We didn’t go to any museums at all, wandered and wandered but did we really “see” Florence? It’s lovely and charming but I’m starting to think we are spoiled rotten New Yorkers who have so much food, shopping, art at our fingertips that we get to a city like Florence and think, Eh, kind of run down…That is not to say we didn’t love it, and I especially the Oltarno are where our hotel was – I prefer trying to see the city like locals do rather than as tourists, so in that respect we definitely succeeded. But oops, we sort of forgot about all the art. And museums. And I never had the Tuscan beans I wanted to try!

I think Kent and I will like Milan a lot, although I know it won’t have the charm of Florence. Still it will be good for us to get back to the normal hustle and bustle of a city with city people doing city things. I do not want to fight my way through any more crowds from Indiana! There is a Nobu there – I know it’s not what you’re supposed to eat in Italy but I would kill for some sushi and good beer.

Wednesday night. Okay. So Milan done kicked our ass. I wish I could find the words to explain this city without doing it an utter disservice. But all I can say, over and over again, is that Milan kicked our ass. This city is intense. We got in yesterday at 3:00 and took a cab to our hotel. Initially we were both delighted – once we got away from the train station the streets turned pretty – old, lovely buildings that reminded me of Paris. I had heard that Milan was ugly and that Fascist buildings dominated, but really it looked beautiful – grand, old and a little gritty but grand nonetheless. We got to our hotel, which we could tell right off the bat was much cooler than us. Our room is very chic – distressed metal, modern art on the walls, etc. A small terrace with a direct view of the Duomo, only ½ block away. The Duomo here, by the way, is breathtaking.

After getting settled in, we walked out towards the Duomo, but first had the concierge make us two dinner reservations for Wednesday and Thursday night. He suggested traditional Italian, casual, on Wednesday, and more of a “scene” on Thursday. More on that later. But, we thanked him and walked into the huge Piazza Duomo. The church itself is such a sight – it’s enormous, and gothic, and it has an almost aggressive look to it, the spires are all THAT tall, and it is reaching up to God with all its might. It is beautiful. We walked and ended up at a castle. Really, a castle. Walked inside where there is a very peaceful park, lots of cats and school groups, lovely, with ruins and the day was nice and sunny. After seeing the castle we wandered through quieter residential streets and ended up in the Brera area, where we had panini and drinks, and did some people-watching. At this point I was 100% in love with Milan. It’s beautiful, but VERY fast-paced, which I liked after Florence. It’s a working city, and in the short time we’d been there we’d seen some of the best looking and best dressed working suits ever – we watched gorgeous men in perfectly tailored suits (and I mean PERFECT) ride by on bikes, totally unwrinkled. Women on scooters in 4” heels, everyone with perfectly tailored clothes and big, glam sunglasses. No one was overweight or sloppy, everyone was gorgeous and everyone was moving QUICKLY. At first I thought, “Ahhh, we are home,” thought that Milan was New York + Paris, maybe. Walked over towards the main shopping area – called the Golden Quad – at which point began our downward spiral.

Now, I live in New York and can SHOP, but this was UNREAL. The shops were SO glam, the shoppers were SO glam, it was all so, SO GLAM. Made Madison Avenue look like a shitty mall in Ohio. Not only did I feel like a fucking bumpkin in the big city, but I felt like I was a visual affront to all the pretty people of Milan, like me and my messy self were clouding their visual space and ruining the view. Eventually we were in Miu Miu and I gave up or gave in or whatever, and decided to spend some money in order to feel better. Healthy, no? I ended up with adorable slingbacks, but almost cried at least twice because it was so hard to get salespeople’s help. And when I asked for my size, all the pretty Italian salespeople conferred in a corner and I am sure they were talking about the BIG AMERICAN and her BIG AMERICAN FEET that were, if nothing else, evidence of the vulgarity of American culture and proof that we in the USA are fat, stupid, tasteless. And fat, again.

Took a nap at the hotel and got ready for our “casual” night out – restaurant was traditional Italian, but the crowd seemed very hip – rock star-looking guys from the U.K., fashion people, suits, girls in teeny tops. We sat down at 9:30, and the 11:00 crowd seemed pretty hip to us. Food was good – fine, not as good as plenty of restaurants in New York, but fine. I had risotto with saffron and sea bass baked with zucchini blossoms, Kent had pappardelle ragu and beef tenderloin. We had a nice Nebbiolo d’Alba to drink and gelato for dessert. Kent’s pasta was definitely the best of all the courses. It was all fine and good and as we left we laughed because the hotel concierge had said this place was causal and traditional, but it seemed pretty hopping to us. And we have been to plenty of cool, hip places (okay, maybe not plenty, but SOME), so we thought we had an inkling of what ‘casual’ versus ‘hip’ was. We were so wrong. SO wrong! Because Milan is intense and kicked our ass!

Thursday. Got up and had shitty pastry and coffee from overpriced tourist place near Duomo. I was cranky because I was having awful allergies. After breakfast we shopped a little bit, but it was largely disappointing. All the shops were lovely but we have them in New York too, and we have boutiques with interesting things and also things I can afford! Shops here are flashier and more expensive than what I wanted, ditto for Kent who was so excited for Armani but ultimately let down. Much of the Armani stuff looks like it is meant for 18 year old Euro-boys, not [boring] MBAs. Had lunch in the same area as yesterday, then went to the Duomo. Will finish telling about it, but need to sleep now.

Continued. Am now sitting at the gate of Milan airport and cannot wait to get home. Feel stinky and bloated and want to take a shower, even though I showered this morning. Hour-long cab ride to airport made me feel dirty, I guess. I am tired of traveling and feel quite disgusting, especially feel that hair is a mess and stomach is looming large. Hate to think that I gained weight on vacation but it is seeming quite likely as I sit here and try not to freak out about my stomach, the lack of air in the terminal, or the screaming kid doing summersaults near my chair. In this moment, I feel truly awful and cannot wait to be home. Yesterday was just too, too much.

After lunch we walked back to the Duomo. I should point out that the air in Milan is full of little white fluffy seed things – kind of like dandelions but smaller and lighter. I don’t know what they are, but they are everywhere and I think that I am highly allergic to them. Yesterday I was a sneezy, sniffly mess and took a Benadryl which made me slightly less sneezy but much, much crankier and more tired. Oh, and hungry. So, we got to the Duomo after stopping in many more shops and me getting frustrated and sneezing and getting mad at Kent because he said he was looking for brown leather slip-on loafers, and every single store we went in carried MANY brown slip-on loafers, but he would get quiet and look and look and then all of a sudden bolt from the store without trying on anything. I was tired and not feeling well and ready to PUNCH HIM DEAD. We got to the Piazza Duomo in the worst of moods, and I was at the point where all I wanted was to be alone. We sat on the steps of the Duomo and had lemon granita and contemplated the ways in which our day was sucking. Eventually a couple walked through the plaza with a little puppy that looked like Tuesday, and we watched the puppy trying to chase pigeons which cheered us up. We went into the cathedral.

It is a church meant to inspire awe, and it did, without a doubt. It is enormous, and everywhere you turn is something reaching up, up, up. It reminded me of Lord of the Rings – I forget the context, but in the movie there is a scene with huge pillars and statues, and that is how the Duomo felt. Enormous. After looking inside we walked around the corner and then climbed up to the top of the building. There weren’t as many steps as the Duomo in Florence, but when we reached the top, we were walking ON the roof, on marble, right next to the spires. It’s amazing to me that tourists are allowed access like that, but it was definitely worth the climb up. It’s interesting to compare the Duomo in Florence to the Milan cathedral – in Florence, from the top, the town is laid out like a postcard below you and it is easy to imagine that the city looks basically the same as it did 400 years ago. Terracotta as far as the eye can see. In Milan, the church itself is much more dramatic, much more in-your-face, Gothic where the Florence church is Roman. But from the roof, Milan is moving. It is a working city, it sprawls in every direction, there is pollution and congestion. The buildings nearest the Duomo are ancient and beautiful and you can see “old Milan” very easily, but once you look beyond the first few blocks, there are construction cranes everywhere. Milan moves very fast.

After the Duomo we wandered a bit more, and ventured into the Prada store nearest our hotel – the first Prada store. I tried on shoes but eventually bought sunglasses. (Interrupting to point out that I am still at the airport and that an announcement just came over the loudspeaker informing us of a strike from 12pm until 4pm, all flights that fall in that time are either delayed or cancelled. Ours is scheduled to leave at 12:20. FUCK.)

And then dinner. The dinner for which words cannot possibly be enough. At the concierge’s recommendation we went to Roberto Cavalli’s restaurant, Just Cavalli Café. It is away from downtown Milan, in a park. We went through two ropes – not velvet, but just as intimidating, and finally found our way to the restaurant, after navigating through hundreds of hot bodies at some PR event in the courtyard. Got to the restaurant, which was all hot pink, zebra print and gaudy chandeliers. And the place was empty. We had made reservations for 9:30, assured by the concierge that people in Milan did not dine late like the “wild Spanish.” But at 9:30, there was one other couple in the restaurant, and we were seated next to them. Soon, though, it filled up, and I mean FULL, with…supermodels. And Italian rock stars and football stars and other gorgeous people. Literal supermodels – ones I recognized from magazines – were EVERYWHERE I TURNED. I have never wished so badly to have my friends with me, because I knew I would not be able to do the scene justice. Kent and I were basically invisible, surrounded but the most beautiful humans imaginable, more beautiful than any I have ever, ever, EVER seen. I suddenly understood why so much of middle America is fat and ugly (am stereotyping, I know, there are uglies all over the damn place) – it is because God looked at Arkansas (sorry, Arkansas!) and said, “I’m sorry but Milan got all the pretty. We’re all out.” It was UNREAL. The women were so, so GLAM. Tall, thin, sexy, wearing next to nothing. The men oozed $$. I swear there were famous people there, everyone was staring at the tables on either side of us. Supermodels. Everywhere. I just wanted to go HOME!

Okay, we are on the plane now which seems promising in light of the strike. Air traffic controllers are striking but will first let us leave, I guess, which is excellent news because if we had to spend an extra night in the Milan airport Kent would divorce me, so cranky would I be. I hope I am not a bad traveler. I don’t want to be a bad traveler and I don’t want to be someone who only travels to touristy spots – I want to be able to experience cities and I want to “do” stuff. But maybe we did this trip backwards – Florence was sleepier, so maybe it would have been better to start in Milan, which apparently doesn’t sleep, then go to Florence and relax. Maybe staying outside the city, somewhere in Tuscany where we had the option to take day trips – or just lounge at home – would be ideal. This trip was good, and I enjoyed parts of it immensely, but right now, I just want to GO HOME. I didn’t feel that way about Paris when we went there. Paris felt like a place I could go over and over again and never get sick of it. Before coming to Italy I didn’t really know if it was Paris that I loved, or Europe, or travel. But I think I could live in Paris, and I want to go back very much. It was good to have that confirmed. Not that I didn’t love this trip, just that Paris to me was perfect. It was like New York, in that I could wander and wander and never get sick of it. I guess the biggest shock about Italy – well, about Milan – was how ill-prepared I was.

I really thought that as a New Yorker I would have no problem assimilating to the city life, and in the tourist areas, I was fine. But in downtown Milan, we were so far out of our league it was laughable. I really thought I’d be fine – I think New York has beautiful women and glamorous men, but it was nothing like dinner at Cavalli Café. I didn’t know women came that beautiful, and they were everywhere. As Kent said – and he gallantly tried to deny how obviously out-classed I was – with one small head swivel he could see 12 supermodels. We saw plenty of models in Milan, but I swear at dinner we were SURROUNDED by the most elite of all Milan. One woman – black, British with short hair and a bra-top – was holding court behind Kent and he said he kept thinking people were staring at him then realized the entire restaurant was staring at her. We left dinner around midnight, and the scene was just getting going. Like I said before, the food was blah but MAN, the scene! I felt smaller and smaller as the night went on. Then, this morning we had breakfast in the hotel and shared an elevator upstairs with a sullen model. I grabbed my suitcase, ready to get back to Brooklyn, where the people are gorgeous but still within this stratosphere. Take me back to New York, our little hick town.

Add comment May 24th, 2005

Firenze

Sunday. Kent and I arrived in Florence late in the afternoon and in BAD moods – the train from Milan took longer than we anticipated and both of us were tired, hungry, thirsty, uncomfortable and cranky. Luckily as soon as we got to our hotel we started to feel better – the hotel is very modern and chic, very cool and in an old area of Florence, on the “other” side of the river, mostly Italians over here, kind of the Village of Florence. We checked in and walked along Via Pisana looking for lunch. It was around 5pm, but hot, and there was a streetfair – lots of locals. We sat outside at Il Bovaro and ate. I had a panini with prosciutto and mascarpone and Kent had a pizza with grilled eggplant and fontina cheese. He had a beer and I had an enormous glass of wine. The food was excellent and very cheap. Kent’s pizza had tomato sauce that tasted like tomatoes x100 – so much flavor, so sweet – very good! The bread was good, we sat outside and watched people – lots of dogs, even some that barked and barked like Tuesday (ie, as if they wanted to eat the face off the other dog and then piss in the gaping hole). After lunch we walked over a bridge and explored a little bit.

Add comment May 18th, 2005

Green

It was some sort of Greek Life sanctioned spring event, a Spring Fling or Daffodil Days or Fun in the Sun, and my sorority was in a tug-of-war tournament and there was no way for me to get out of it. And at no point in my life prior to this tug-of-war had the rules of the game ever been detailed to me beyond the basic (long rope, pull, fall, win), but it suddenly became clear that before the tug, there was to be a weigh-in. Apparently teams were by the pound, not by the body count, so all participants needed to step on a scale set in the middle of the quad. When I was my turn I stepped on and rolled my eyes at my friends, like Oh my GOD, you GUYS! I can’t believe we have to GET WEIGHED, like, I feel SOO fat! And “Son of a Preacher Man was blasting over the loudspeaker and girls were dancing in sorority t-shirts and Jack Purcell sneakers and I watched the dial spin on the scale as I stepped on. Unbeknownst to me, this bitch named Jessica stepped behind me and put her foot on the scale too, and I saw 150 go by, then 160, then 170…and I was HORRIFIED, because HELLO THERE WERE FRATERNITY GUYS NEARBY and what if they saw? WHAT IF THEY KNEW HOW MUCH I WEIGHED? And what if they thought it was 170 pounds?? The bitch behind me stepped off the scale laughing and the numbers dipped back to an acceptable “decade” and eventually settled just slightly higher than what I weigh today. But I stepped off the scale shaking, angry, and worse, terrified. And so began my obsession with weight.

Of course the beginning wasn’t quite as clearly marked as that, and of course my high school years had their share of body image demons, but there is something about being 20 and thin and healthy and then feeling your chest constrict in fear, fear that you might weigh too much, not knowing what too much was, but knowing that you did not, you really, really did not want to weigh Too Much. And I was an athlete at that point, still fit enough to call myself an ‘athlete’ without smirking, at least. But still, the fear, the horror, the panic of WHAT IF SOMEONE THOUGHT I WEIGHED TOO MUCH? came over me. And moved in, camping out permanently somewhere between my psyche and my ass.

My weight has gone up and has gone down and has gone up and has gone down since then, and the invisible marker that has always stood at the Now You Are Fat point has been passed twice on the way up, twice on the way down, and for the past few years I have maintained a consistent weight that is juuuussssst this side of Where I Really Want To Be (meaning, Oh, to be seven pounds lighter…). But my weight, my size, have not come easy, and it is not diet nor exercise to which I refer, not the portion control or treadmill that has been my adversary. I keep my monsters closer to me, deep, deep inside, and if I had a dollar for every time I have squeezed my eyes shut and wished, wished so hard to have the perfect body, for every time I have stood in the shower and run my hands over my belly and willed it flatter, for every pair of pants that made me want to cry as I tried to pull them up just a little higher and I will be able to button them, a dollar for every time I have stared at smooth legs and jutting hip bones and small waists and chests with bony ladders of ribs going 1-2-3-4-5 down to their navel and wanted it, wanted it so badly…well, I would have enough dollars to fly us all to my private island where the sheets are all Egyptian cotton and backfat is worshipped as a sign of intelligence and splendor.

It’s a disease, really it is, an insidious black bug that gets in your brain and feeds on your confidence and your pride and your memories of being 15, healthy and carefree, and it wrecks you. And it is always there. The envy I feel for those with narrow waists and slim legs, the shame of my own pasty thighs, the want – the paralyzing, nauseating, consuming WANT to be thinner…I carry it with me, everywhere I go, every second and minute and hour of my day, it is a deep, dark bruise, a wound, a scar that aches and dares me to press on it and feel that little rock inside, the small, hard place where my greenest, ugliest jealousy curls up with my rawest insecurity and breeds black, black thoughts.

On Friday I walked to the subway behind a group of three girls. They were 11 or 12, on their way to school, one had a flute case with her and one had capri pants and feet that were too big for her gangly body. And as I walked I stared at their bodies. I stared at their skinny adolescent hips and their legs – their legs that had never been shaved, that were thin and taunt and brown, legs that were smooth and thin and that ended in pink sneakers and clumsy young feet. And I wanted them. I wanted spindly young legs that had never known cellulite and hips that had never known the scorn of a bitchy sales associate. I knew it was wrong, but I stared at those girls, none of them a day over 12, and I wanted their bodies, and when one of them dropped her keys and bent over I counted the vertebrae on her skinny back and with shame realized I wanted that too. And if you think that is shameful, let me tell you that there is no humiliation quite like bending over a toilet, sticking a toothbrush down your throat repeatedly in hopes of getting every last bit of food out of your stomach. Your eyes are watering and your nose is dripping and there is snot and vomit on your hand and it doesn’t matter because you want to be empty, you want to feel EMPTY, you want the food out and you want to feel the virtue of an empty belly again. Every bite is bad, is wrong and you are jealous of the girls who can will themselves to not eat, you can’t do that, but you can do the next best thing and in a humiliating, shameful, painful game of catch-up, you plan your meals around times and places to void your belly. You try to remember the first thing you ate and you keep jabbing that toothbrush or pen or finger down your throat until you see something that might be your first bite, and then you start to relax and you blow your nose and you wipe your eyes and brush your teeth and promise to never, ever do it again. You rejoin your husband or friends or table. And you look at the people around you who chew and swallow without hesitation, who are not afraid of their food, and you feel envy that makes your eyes ache.

In the same way that you sometimes look at other people and wonder, Did they have sex today, Do they ever get diarrhea or gas, How much money do they make, I look at women and wonder, What does it feel like? What does it feel like to have skinny legs whose thighs never touch, to have to ask for a smaller size, to have the bitch salespeople look at you with ADMIRATION because you have done it, you have triumphed, you have proved your worth and value by the size of your jeans and I wear a size 29 and that is too fucking big, I am a size six and it is not small enough, I am tall and skinny but not skinny enough and I look at other women and wonder, What does it feel like. If they are bigger than me I wonder how they can be happy, I want to know how to be happy with my shape, how to let go of my ugly green monster once and for all. If they are thin I barely notice whether or not they look happy, I just look at the twin X’s of their pelvic bones strung with denim and I covet their physique.

It is an obsession born early, nurtured in its dormant state for years, and without warning, it roars. It suddenly gnaws at you, and you stare at hips and bellies and shoulders and ankles and you think, five more pounds, five more pounds, just five more pounds.

I plan on turning 30 healthy, though. I am familiar enough with my wicked little demon to find comfort in it, almost, like a fading bruise, and those pangs of jealousy sting me in much more lucid ways these days, front and center instead of deep inside. I can feel them coming and breathe through it and look around my house, my life and see all that I have that is good and know that who I am is more than a series of measurements. I can deal with the waves of envy and obsession like birthing pains, like cramps, and come out the other side stronger and more focused, and that is why tonight I pulled on my running shoes and took my size-six-sometimes-an-eight-with-belly-roll-and-back-fat-but-it’s-okay-body out for a run and tried to concentrate on putting one leg in front of the other and feeling lungs and muscles and breath instead of shame and envy. I ran along the Promenade which was full of mothers and lovers and sisters and brothers, dogs and strollers and homeless men and beautiful women and tourists and cigar smoke and babies with ice cream dripping down their faces, and the city was pink in the sunset and in that moment I forgot the jiggle in my ass and instead looked at the brownstones and high-rises and felt myself getting sucked into a whole other vortex of Want, which is the beauty of New York as well as its worst trait, that you are constantly rubbing shoulders with someone who is thinner, more beautiful, richer, living in a better home, attended a better school, walking a more well-behaved dog, sitting at a better table, better, better, best, within a few square miles. My little green monster has ample fodder to feed on here. But I feel that wisdom and serenity hovering on the other side of the door, and I do not want my friends to say, Yes, Molly is so thin, Molly has the flattest stomach; I want them to say I am smart and kind and funny and compassionate and not begrudge me a messy apartment or a t-shirt that clings to the backfat. My friends are good, good people who never would, but I am learning to realign my own priorities, or to look at them honestly, at least. To be beautiful is special but to be loved is essential.

If I have children it will be in my thirties, and if I have a daughter I do not want her to regret her hips for an instant of her life. I would not wish this on anyone, and envy is dangerous. I think it is easy to lose sight of what was originally coveted and instead become obsessed with the desire. I remember girls in college who would sit in the cafeteria slowly eating a bowl of milk with a banana, their ritual act of eating, and they were sick, these poor girls, sick with a disease and they were lonely and unhappy and sad and I think that they probably started innocently, eyeing someone else’s smooth, thin body with jealousy and eventually losing themselves in the obsession, the disease.

It’s exhausting, I tell you.

And for me it is my body and for you it may be a better job or a better house or the perfect shoes or a sports team or a band or a fetish or a woman or a man, but don’t we all have something that burrows deep and keeps us awake at night? Don’t we all have an ugly green side, breathing hoarsely in our ear in certain quiet moments? It’s slippery and malleable and cool and smooth, but there is something, in all of us, that catches in our throats and makes us want and want and want. How we feed it or starve it or nurture it or kill it epic. I’m just relieved to have identified it.

Add comment April 10th, 2005

Ramble On…

During my sophomore year of high school, I spent nearly every lunch period in my geometry teacher’s classroom learning to play Bridge. I told Kent that once, hoping for either sympathy or a laugh, but truthfully, lunching in the math room wasn’t something that made me sad, or embarrassed. In high school I was not unpopular, more removed than anything else, and for lack of any better place to eat in 10th grade (we had no cafeteria, most of my close friends went to different schools), I wandered into Ms. Cox’s room. A few other people eventually joined me, and Ms. Cox taught us to play. The fact that when I was 14, I lunched with a math teacher and two semi-misfits, playing Bridge and eating bag lunches, is rarely at the forefront of my conscience: high school left me with no battle scars, no baggage that I still carry, no sadness or horror stories. On the contrary, high school was so fleeting, so temporary, so very, very long ago that I barely remember it at all, and when I do, I can hardly believe that I – me, who sits here right now, typing in a cold apartment at a white desk, living with a man, wearing his wedding ring, cooking dinner and returning voice mails and ordering sushi – ever actually experienced the events depicted in my yearbooks. I see pictures of me with friends, dressing up for Homecoming or sitting in the journalism room, but who I am now and who I was then are separated by so much more than miles and years that when I told Kent I spent 10th grade lunching with my geometry teacher, learning to play Bridge, it felt like I was recounting something I’d read, some characteristic attributed to a minor celebrity about whom I’d recently read an interview.

Add comment January 16th, 2005