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what goes round comes round
02/27/2008 = 06:10 AM

An Open Letter to My Body, to an Unnamed Celebrity, and to a Trumpet Player:

Last summer, a great hue and cry was raised about a celebrity who was at a beach, in a bathing suit, looking rather more overweight than the size S (for "skeleton") the public tends to expect — nay, feels it deserves — from its celebrities.

Arguments brewed from both camps: the public, including press, that found it outrageous that this celebrity dared bare her womanly curves in an open space, exposing them to our gazes just because she wanted a little sunshine and a nice beachy breeze on her skin; and her defenders, who said, among other things, that she wasn't exactly fat, just not, you know, uncurvy.

Me, I knew just what had happened. Because it has happened to me, too.

First, my story.

When I was a kid, I was fairly thin and active. I was too clumsy to be considered athletic as such, and couldn't catch anything other than a grounder to save my arse (pretty much guaranteeing me a position at second base for life), but I rode my bike almost everywhere, walked everywhere that didn't have a place to lock my bike, and swam whenever I found a body of water deep enough to float in.

I got teased for other things, such as being smart, or not having designer clothes or haircuts like the other kids, but I soon learned to use my wits, coupled with my big mouth, to get me out of any bad situations that might crop up. They could laugh, but it wasn't as much fun if I was already laughing, so eventually, the teasing stopped.

The problem was that I had already developed the wits-coupled-with-big-mouth thing from a conscious exercise to a subconscious reflex.

To the point where, at the band banquet, someone on one side of the room yelled something about taking a picture of the brilliantly talented but rather hefty first trumpet player, and on my side of the room, I automatically called back the reply, "We need a wide-angle lens."

The second the words left my lips, I hated myself. It was the first time I would get a laugh without having it feel good, and I was horrified at just how low I had stooped.

When the dancing started, I asked First Trumpet to dance, and I apologized to him, and he said it was okay, but we both knew it wasn't. We danced the whole dance, he still looking hurt and trying to hide it, I feeling like the complete and total bitch I was.

A few years later, I was diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, and a few other maladies here and there that made whatever physical activity I could muster incredibly painful. I also got my own car, which meant that even if I could still ride my bike as far as I once did, I didn't need to.

And I got fat. Really fat.

I'm not big and fat, but only because I fall short, literally, to be considered big and anything. I'm short and fat.

Round, is what I am.

I got sick, fat, and, consequently, lazy, to punish me, because it wasn't enough that I had learned to take teasing when I was a kid — I had to learn that teasing was hurtful and not right.

I'm paying for it now, every time I get out of the shower and look at my fat, pain-wracked body and think that I deserve every last pound of it. Not only did I eat myself into this shape, but I hurt someone who might have been a really great person. To get a laugh.

Ugh.

As to that celebrity, her defenders seem to have forgotten that, a few years ago, she dressed in a fat suit for Halloween. Not just any fat suit ... it was one of those nylon pillowy things that make the wearer look like a fat girl in a bathing suit. It was meant to be funny.

I think she's finding out what I already knew.

What goes round, comes round.

P.S. Dear First Trumpet: If I had the nerve, I'd send you a picture of myself right now, so you could get the last laugh. You deserve that ... and so do I.

P.P.S. Dear Celebrity: You're not fat. And I'm glad you spoke out about it. But I still wish you'd apologized for wearing that fat Halloween costume. Some of us felt kind of bad when we saw you in it.

P.P.P.S. Dear Body: I'm so sorry.

Tags: BlogHer, Letter To My Body

drinking: coffee
listening to: Silverchair, Straight Lines
should be listening to: Herb Alpert, The Lonely Bull