Monday, November 12, 2007

sixteen tons

i need to start by stating that i know it's all about loving yourself and being comfortable in your own skin. i need to say that i believe fashion magazines are pure garbage and that north americans hate fat people . . . even though we are fat people. i also, most importantly, need to say that the only thing that defines beauty is a lack of definition. virginia woolf is beautiful in a long, pointy-nose kind of way. natalie portman is beautiful in a tiny, big-eyed, childlike kind of way. queen latifah is beautiful in a zaftig kind of way. having said all that, i think i'm too fat.

i've ballooned twice in the past two years - once last xmas, when i had my standard grad-student-nervous-breakdown, and once again in the past two months as i stumbled over the deadline. i have three pairs of pants that fit me and all my shirts ride up too high. my waist is getting thicker and thicker. i need to wear the awful-named plus-size. OR DO I? who the hell knows? everyone's so damn concerned about what's beautiful and what's not that any standardization in sizing (an idea that has its own problems) goes out the window.

ran down to reitman's in an attempt to find something to wear to my graduation on friday. found three shirts and one dress, went for size 16 in all of them. (size sixteen plus size, not size sixteen normal. reitman's normal stuff goes up to fifteen, but plus starts at fourteen. AND A PLUS FOURTEEN MAY OR MAY NOT BE THE SAME AS A NORMAL FOURTEEN. WTF?)

one sixteen fit. one sixteen was too snug around the breasts but hung like a sack around the middle and sleeves. one was too small. one was too big. and these are four pieces in the same size from the same line from the same store.

why am i telling you this? i'm telling myself that the label is nothing but a damn number that makes no sense to anyone anyway. nobody sees my label but me, so why should i care if it says fourteen or sixteen or eighteen or thirty-two?

(well, because i think i'm too fat. but at least i'm fat and i have a pretty blouse to wear at my graduation. small mercies, no pun intended.)

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