I have been a Stephen King fan ever since I began going to the library on my own. I'm not sure how I learned about him. Perhaps it was the movies that were popular around that time: Cujo. Christine. The Shining. Whatever it was, I was immediately intrigued by King and wanted to read him, not simply because I enjoyed being grossed out and getting the pants scared off me. Stephen King represented adulthood to me, and as such equaled freedom from the semi-miserable childhood I was having. (Only semi, especially compared to Carrie).
So...Stephen King. In the adult section of the library?
Check.
Cover art that ranged from lurid to terrifying?
Check.
Creative swearing?
Christ on his throne, yes. Check.
Un-put-down-able compulsive late night read under the covers?
Check. Check. Check.
What began as a toe into the water of adult reading eventually became a life-long relationship. I have read nearly every King book published, as they came out, with a few important exceptions: I have only read the first book of the Dark Tower series, which for many King fans is his best work. Most other canonical King I've read multiple times (The Shining, Misery, Pet Sematary, Different Seasons) and a lot of the non-canonical King too, like The Eyes of the Dragon (for kids...maybe), Rose Madder (surprisingly feminist) and all of the Bachman books--especially my favorite, Roadwork (more on that later).
King is not always consistently good--there are a few stinkers in his repertoire, and some (more critical than me) would say that excellent books like The Shining are the exception, rather than the rule. But yes, I have The Tommy Knockers, Cell, and From a Buick 8 in hardback, because I just couldn't wait until they came out in paperback or were available at the library. King IS however, surprising. Different Seasons contains two of the best stories I've ever read: Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, and The Body, which were also made into two of my favorite movies: The Shawshank Redemption and Stand by Me. Neither is classic-spooky horror fare, though there is plenty of horror. Of a different sort. Moo-ah-ah-ah! And then there was On Writing, one of the best books on the craft of writing by anyone's measure. Except the haters. Did you know that there are King haters? Some of them are even related to me.
In any case, Stephen King is one of my favorite authors, someone I literally grew up reading, and for whom I retain boundless respect and affection. Yes, there are some stinkers, but when you're that prolific, there's going to be stinkers. Relax. It's all recreational reading anyway, right?
Recently, I've been reflecting on the books that made me who I am today, and realizing that they have titles like "Dolores Claiborne" and "It" rather than "To Kill a Mockingbird" or "Moby Dick." And because I'm always up for a series idea, and always up for reading Stephen King, I thought it would be fun to read his books in order, from Carrie to Finders Keepers, and do a little mash-up of literary criticism and memoir. I am, after all, a trained literary critic.
As I go through the books in the order they were published, I will hit the ones I missed (Dark Tower, yes yes) and revisit the ones I loved (Pet Sematary, Misery, Different Seasons). I'll also revisit the lesser canon of King (Gerald's Game, Hearts in Atlantis, Lisey's Story) and see how well they hold up. Yes, even Cell.
Join me! Comments welcome and encouraged, even if you are a King hater, but especially if these books meant something to you. At one point in my life, they meant nearly everything to me.
Up next: Carrie, or, You Thought YOUR first period was traumatic?
Monday, September 7, 2015
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Run with It
Last winter, even during temperatures in the 'teens, I busted my ass to get down to the running/biking path that abuts Lake Michigan to prepare for a 10K run in April. It was partly for the exercise, partly for the bragging rights--though I draw the line at temps in the single or negative digits--but also because the Lake Michigan path is the crossroads where freaks, geeks, old, young, fat, thin, bearded, shaved, fast, slow, and everyone in between gets their run on.
In fact, the whole shoreline is a guaranteed cultural experience. I have seen young lovers salsa dancing in their bathing suits, a motorcyclist with an enormous tattoo of Satan on his muscled back gently sniffing a dandelion, elderly Russian women sunbathing in their bras, children of all colors screaming in all languages, including the universal "gaaaah why are you exposing me to nature?" language, and picnics with several generations of stoners getting their buzz on.
The running path itself was no less diverse, though it had less pot smoking. However, there was the same amount of nudity and screaming, sometimes combined in the same jogger. My favorite was an 80 something grandpa who favored a get up I will charitably call a "running diaper" who was all sinew and bone, not an ounce of fat on his body. This guy would ALWAYS be there (though sans diaper in the winter time) and whenever he got inspired he would ululate at the top of his lungs. Eventually, however, he'd be lapped by a fat woman who'd been plugging away from Belmont Harbor to Navy Pier, without any need for stopping or screaming. She's probably STILL running all the way down to New Orleans today.
In other words, I felt positively mainstream and boring running there.
Back in L.A., I've taken to running around the track at Drake Stadium, which is actually a far more diverse crowd than the neighborhoods of West L.A. When I used to jog through Cheviot Hills, I never encountered anyone other than a bleached-blonde grandma with an enormous, perfectly stationery rack, a rack so hard and immobile that the runner would have to physically gyrate her hips around the weight of her chest. This, the full on makeup, and the bulbous space age headphones with antennae sprouting out of them make me think of her fondly as "the robot." She would never overtly acknowledge me, but I like to think that she wonders how I am doing sometimes, as I wonder about her.
Yeah, I know. Probably not.
In any case, Drake Stadium is home to hungover teen runners of various speeds and states of undress, so it is almost like coming home to Lake Michigan. Unlike the neighborhood joggers, everyone is clearly there to run rather than been seen running, and most of them are in incredible shape. Every once in a while I have the satisfaction of lapping a scornful pair of sorority sisters, but usually I am the old lady (man?) in the tattered sweatpants that people nod kindly at.
Today, as I was heaving and sobbing through my 8th lap around the track (that's nearly the 2 mile mark for those keeping score at home) a beautifully sculpted Adonis whose running shorts clung lovingly to his granite buttocks gave me a thumbs up and said, "Way to go, mama!" These words of praise and the brief moment of runners' solidarity gave me the strength to finish the lap and go one more.
Did he call me "mama" because I had obviously whelped twins? Because I was old enough to be his? Or was he (I just now thought of this) being sarcastic? I do not know. But I'm going to focus on the "way to go" and try not to wonder what else he might have been observing other than a plump 40 something hauling her jiggly ass across the finish line. Adonis would have rocked the hell out of a running diaper, but as it is he'll have to stand in for the weirdos of Lake Michigan in standard work out gear.
Way to go, Los Angeles.
In fact, the whole shoreline is a guaranteed cultural experience. I have seen young lovers salsa dancing in their bathing suits, a motorcyclist with an enormous tattoo of Satan on his muscled back gently sniffing a dandelion, elderly Russian women sunbathing in their bras, children of all colors screaming in all languages, including the universal "gaaaah why are you exposing me to nature?" language, and picnics with several generations of stoners getting their buzz on.
The running path itself was no less diverse, though it had less pot smoking. However, there was the same amount of nudity and screaming, sometimes combined in the same jogger. My favorite was an 80 something grandpa who favored a get up I will charitably call a "running diaper" who was all sinew and bone, not an ounce of fat on his body. This guy would ALWAYS be there (though sans diaper in the winter time) and whenever he got inspired he would ululate at the top of his lungs. Eventually, however, he'd be lapped by a fat woman who'd been plugging away from Belmont Harbor to Navy Pier, without any need for stopping or screaming. She's probably STILL running all the way down to New Orleans today.
In other words, I felt positively mainstream and boring running there.
Back in L.A., I've taken to running around the track at Drake Stadium, which is actually a far more diverse crowd than the neighborhoods of West L.A. When I used to jog through Cheviot Hills, I never encountered anyone other than a bleached-blonde grandma with an enormous, perfectly stationery rack, a rack so hard and immobile that the runner would have to physically gyrate her hips around the weight of her chest. This, the full on makeup, and the bulbous space age headphones with antennae sprouting out of them make me think of her fondly as "the robot." She would never overtly acknowledge me, but I like to think that she wonders how I am doing sometimes, as I wonder about her.
Yeah, I know. Probably not.
In any case, Drake Stadium is home to hungover teen runners of various speeds and states of undress, so it is almost like coming home to Lake Michigan. Unlike the neighborhood joggers, everyone is clearly there to run rather than been seen running, and most of them are in incredible shape. Every once in a while I have the satisfaction of lapping a scornful pair of sorority sisters, but usually I am the old lady (man?) in the tattered sweatpants that people nod kindly at.
Today, as I was heaving and sobbing through my 8th lap around the track (that's nearly the 2 mile mark for those keeping score at home) a beautifully sculpted Adonis whose running shorts clung lovingly to his granite buttocks gave me a thumbs up and said, "Way to go, mama!" These words of praise and the brief moment of runners' solidarity gave me the strength to finish the lap and go one more.
Did he call me "mama" because I had obviously whelped twins? Because I was old enough to be his? Or was he (I just now thought of this) being sarcastic? I do not know. But I'm going to focus on the "way to go" and try not to wonder what else he might have been observing other than a plump 40 something hauling her jiggly ass across the finish line. Adonis would have rocked the hell out of a running diaper, but as it is he'll have to stand in for the weirdos of Lake Michigan in standard work out gear.
Way to go, Los Angeles.
Sunday, February 22, 2015
L.A. Woman
As some of you know, I have a difficult time passing as female. Well, I mean passing as female in sunny Los Angeles, where women take great pains to flaunt their boobies and shaved va-jay-jays in order to authenticate their gender, and men...are everyone else. I have been called "sir" while carrying a purse, wearing a dress, wearing lipstick, and/or sporting a pair of shoes with heels. While my slight mustache and unruly mop of hair do lend me a certain haggard-Jack White-who-has-developed-man-tits-from-eating-too many-glazed-donuts aspect, I would think that my inability to work things with gears would put any gender troubling rumors to rest. I guess not.
To wit: I love butch women. Nothing is hotter to me han a boyish dame who wears flannel shirts, puffy vests, and carries an enormous wrench in her back denim pocket. Women with mullets and bulging biceps to match make me avert my gaze and mutter quietly to myself. Well, most things make me do that, but you know what I mean.
I also can appreciate a femme woman. As my 8th grade Woodworking teacher used to remark, "I like to see a woman in a dress." (Mr. McKeon wasn't shy about sharing his views on most things, except maybe how to avoid slicing off your finger in the band saw). It's nice if it's a quirky sort of dress with Yodas and shit on it, but I'm not particular. I like pretty, sparkly nails and admire anyone who can keep from biting theirs down to the quick like I do. I even like really pointy high heeled shoes. I would wear them myself if I wasn't risking killing myself by falling down the library stairwell.
In other words, I may not be a girly-girl (and my un-manicured hands will always give this away) but I am not that majesty that is a butch woman, which is simply something I can't pull off, not something I scorn or I hate. But if I were, the "sirs" would make more sense. I can only assume that my relative gender neutrality translates to masculine in hyper lady land L.A. In Iowa, I am without question a woman (and relatively thin, even). In California, I am just one of the boys with a fashionably waxed chest and the droopy pectorals of the formerly fit and the currently elderly.
However, I've recently figured out what to wear in L.A. For years, I've gotten my Judith Butler on simply by wearing jeans and a t-shirt. My one concession to femininity has been to favor V-necks over round ones because they accentuate my smallish (but perfectly visible, damn it) breasts. But now I have a uniform, and it all came about quite by accident. Completely depressed to be back in Los Angeles after a year in Chicago, I spent about two weeks wearing my "work out" clothes, which consist of rump-caressing yoga pants and shiny tank tops with the bras built in. During that time, I was not called sir once, and believe me, I'd done nothing unorthodox with my hair, make up, or toes. In fact, my toes were in need of a shaving, but they were usually covered in my $150 running shoes.
And that was it! This particular "athletic" look I'd put together assembled some of the priciest items in my meager Midwestern wardrobe. I'd clearly spent money, and my tits were on prominent display. Also, I was apparently ready to drop whatever I was doing at any given moment and go exercise. These three components spell WOMAN, people. I had cracked L.A.'s gender code!
Until I throw on a ratty sweatshirt or other piece of lumberjack-wear. Then it's back to the "sirs" and weird looks when I enter the Ladies room and whatnot.
So where's my male privilege, damn it? It's just LIKE the patriarchy not to kick in when the man behind the boyish pose is a woman. I think I need to go even further, cut off all my hair, and stuff my pants with a foil-covered cucumber. As long as I don't have to go through any metal detectors or change a tire, I think my secret will be safe.
To wit: I love butch women. Nothing is hotter to me han a boyish dame who wears flannel shirts, puffy vests, and carries an enormous wrench in her back denim pocket. Women with mullets and bulging biceps to match make me avert my gaze and mutter quietly to myself. Well, most things make me do that, but you know what I mean.
I also can appreciate a femme woman. As my 8th grade Woodworking teacher used to remark, "I like to see a woman in a dress." (Mr. McKeon wasn't shy about sharing his views on most things, except maybe how to avoid slicing off your finger in the band saw). It's nice if it's a quirky sort of dress with Yodas and shit on it, but I'm not particular. I like pretty, sparkly nails and admire anyone who can keep from biting theirs down to the quick like I do. I even like really pointy high heeled shoes. I would wear them myself if I wasn't risking killing myself by falling down the library stairwell.
In other words, I may not be a girly-girl (and my un-manicured hands will always give this away) but I am not that majesty that is a butch woman, which is simply something I can't pull off, not something I scorn or I hate. But if I were, the "sirs" would make more sense. I can only assume that my relative gender neutrality translates to masculine in hyper lady land L.A. In Iowa, I am without question a woman (and relatively thin, even). In California, I am just one of the boys with a fashionably waxed chest and the droopy pectorals of the formerly fit and the currently elderly.
However, I've recently figured out what to wear in L.A. For years, I've gotten my Judith Butler on simply by wearing jeans and a t-shirt. My one concession to femininity has been to favor V-necks over round ones because they accentuate my smallish (but perfectly visible, damn it) breasts. But now I have a uniform, and it all came about quite by accident. Completely depressed to be back in Los Angeles after a year in Chicago, I spent about two weeks wearing my "work out" clothes, which consist of rump-caressing yoga pants and shiny tank tops with the bras built in. During that time, I was not called sir once, and believe me, I'd done nothing unorthodox with my hair, make up, or toes. In fact, my toes were in need of a shaving, but they were usually covered in my $150 running shoes.
And that was it! This particular "athletic" look I'd put together assembled some of the priciest items in my meager Midwestern wardrobe. I'd clearly spent money, and my tits were on prominent display. Also, I was apparently ready to drop whatever I was doing at any given moment and go exercise. These three components spell WOMAN, people. I had cracked L.A.'s gender code!
Until I throw on a ratty sweatshirt or other piece of lumberjack-wear. Then it's back to the "sirs" and weird looks when I enter the Ladies room and whatnot.
So where's my male privilege, damn it? It's just LIKE the patriarchy not to kick in when the man behind the boyish pose is a woman. I think I need to go even further, cut off all my hair, and stuff my pants with a foil-covered cucumber. As long as I don't have to go through any metal detectors or change a tire, I think my secret will be safe.
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
Antisocial Media
When I was back in Dubuque last month, I happened to be checking my Facebook when my mom asked whether or not Facebook had been keeping me from actually, you know, leaving the house and talking to people in Los Angeles. She didn't ask in a snarky or mean way, and quickly amended her point to opine that there probably weren't any people worth being friends with in L.A. anyway. Our move to the Left Coast in 2007 was unpopular with our Midwestern families of origin, and my mom remains an unabashed L.A. hater.
I don't hate L.A. exactly, but it's damn lonely. Or at least, that's been my experience, and I haven't bothered to make much of a secret of that. With the exception of one glorious (if frigid) year spent in Chicago, we've spent almost eight years here. In 2007, we knew nobody. In 2015, we know a few people, but they are (with one exception) all people we knew from other places that MOVED to Los Angeles. What gives?
It's true that I spend more time online with friends than out in the world with them, and I've tended to blame L.A. for that fact. And with Los Angeles being as vast and diverse as it is, I should qualify my remarks by limiting them to West Los Angeles, wherein we (as academics) constitute the unsavory element in the neighborhood. Whenever the kids make friends with a medical doctor's kids, I breathe a sigh of relief because I know they will at least "get" that academia is a legitimate (if impoverished) way to live in the world. Don't get me wrong...people are NICE here. It's just that no one has a lot of time, everyone has a lot of money, friends tend to live 45 minutes apart from each other, and there's not a lot of ways to meet people other than the fundraising activities at your kids' schools.
But here's the thing: my mom is right that my Facebook time makes it increasingly less likely that I will, for example, take a pottery class or go to a reading or join a flute choir or do anything else that is actually, honest to go social. I could be making a hell of a lot more effort, but instead I monitor how many likes and comments I have and worry about who didn't like something and/or who noticed that I didn't like THEIR post, etc. etc.
It reminds me of my bloggy days when I used to check Sitemeter obsessively to see where people were coming from to look at my blog, what my statistics were like, which posts people were reading, who those people were likely to be (based on their domain information) and who my obsessive fan was that kept coming back and rereading all my posts. When that fan turned out to be me, I knew that I had a problem.
I have a Facebook problem now, compounded by my real life loneliness, and it means even more dithering around online and less original writing. While the FB status update is a venerable genre in its own right, it is just not up to the standards of your regular blog post. Or at least, the blog posts that my bloggy friends and I wrote in the waning years of the Bush Jr. administration. We were writing about motherhood, graduate school, sex, death, drugs, alcohol (especially alcohol), our sordid pasts in Catholic school and elsewhere, and creating a community of writers that was (on some days) the only thing keeping me going.
A substitute for real life interaction? Well, I ended up meeting most of my online friends in real life, and not one of them pistol whipped me and left me for dead in a rusty culvert. They were all really nice, sometimes adorably socially awkward, and the conversations were every bit as awesome offline as they had been online. Most importantly, we were writers and women who supported one another in both capacities. It was one of the happiest times of my life.
And then...we quit. One by one. Some of us still post every month or so, but that vibrant community of women writers is gone. Now we are all FB friends and follow each others' posts and comments and links with the same avid attention of our bloggy days. But it's not the same. Not the same at all.
Still, the benefits of FB, particularly to a person in exile from her Midwest homeland, have been phenomenal. I love knowing what's going on with friends and having the most recent pics of my nieces and nephews. I love realizing that people I dismissed in high school are actually pretty cool and have unexpectedly lefty politics. Even the conservatives have cute babies. I don't de-friend anyone on the basis of politics because I think that, red state or blue state, we should all be forced to look at pictures of each others' kids. It's a divided nation without a doubt, but I refuse to participate in further divisions. FB is a big chaotic mess of links and comments and likes and stories and images and book reviews and chats and jokes, and I love it. I love it all.
But let's see what happens if I give it up for awhile. Lent will be here tomorrow, and I'm enough of a Catholic to take advantage of a six week hiatus from stuff I should be cutting back on anyway. It just so happens that Lent coincides with what will be one of the most intense writing periods of my life. The book manuscript, she will come due. And the first 100 pages need to be done by Easter.
I'm also going to try to stop eating ice cream straight from the container when I wake up at 3:00 a.m., but patience, grasshoppers.
The Sunday dispensation from Lenten resolutions is controversial in some circles, but I want to have it as an option. Other than Sunday, I'll be abstaining from the crackbook and writing whatever observations I can't bear not sharing on the Internet right here. Maybe I'll even get this blog up and running, who knows? In any case, I'll be posting about my progress and checking in once a week.
In addition to writing blog posts and writing book chapters, I will also try to hang out with some actual Angelenos. There are plenty of people that I would like to get to know better. Well OK, not plenty, but enough to occupy a shy type like me for six weeks. And if I keep bombing? More blog fodder, or Sunday FB fodder. But I'm counting on you to keep me honest.
See you at the poetry reading, bitches.
I don't hate L.A. exactly, but it's damn lonely. Or at least, that's been my experience, and I haven't bothered to make much of a secret of that. With the exception of one glorious (if frigid) year spent in Chicago, we've spent almost eight years here. In 2007, we knew nobody. In 2015, we know a few people, but they are (with one exception) all people we knew from other places that MOVED to Los Angeles. What gives?
It's true that I spend more time online with friends than out in the world with them, and I've tended to blame L.A. for that fact. And with Los Angeles being as vast and diverse as it is, I should qualify my remarks by limiting them to West Los Angeles, wherein we (as academics) constitute the unsavory element in the neighborhood. Whenever the kids make friends with a medical doctor's kids, I breathe a sigh of relief because I know they will at least "get" that academia is a legitimate (if impoverished) way to live in the world. Don't get me wrong...people are NICE here. It's just that no one has a lot of time, everyone has a lot of money, friends tend to live 45 minutes apart from each other, and there's not a lot of ways to meet people other than the fundraising activities at your kids' schools.
But here's the thing: my mom is right that my Facebook time makes it increasingly less likely that I will, for example, take a pottery class or go to a reading or join a flute choir or do anything else that is actually, honest to go social. I could be making a hell of a lot more effort, but instead I monitor how many likes and comments I have and worry about who didn't like something and/or who noticed that I didn't like THEIR post, etc. etc.
It reminds me of my bloggy days when I used to check Sitemeter obsessively to see where people were coming from to look at my blog, what my statistics were like, which posts people were reading, who those people were likely to be (based on their domain information) and who my obsessive fan was that kept coming back and rereading all my posts. When that fan turned out to be me, I knew that I had a problem.
I have a Facebook problem now, compounded by my real life loneliness, and it means even more dithering around online and less original writing. While the FB status update is a venerable genre in its own right, it is just not up to the standards of your regular blog post. Or at least, the blog posts that my bloggy friends and I wrote in the waning years of the Bush Jr. administration. We were writing about motherhood, graduate school, sex, death, drugs, alcohol (especially alcohol), our sordid pasts in Catholic school and elsewhere, and creating a community of writers that was (on some days) the only thing keeping me going.
A substitute for real life interaction? Well, I ended up meeting most of my online friends in real life, and not one of them pistol whipped me and left me for dead in a rusty culvert. They were all really nice, sometimes adorably socially awkward, and the conversations were every bit as awesome offline as they had been online. Most importantly, we were writers and women who supported one another in both capacities. It was one of the happiest times of my life.
And then...we quit. One by one. Some of us still post every month or so, but that vibrant community of women writers is gone. Now we are all FB friends and follow each others' posts and comments and links with the same avid attention of our bloggy days. But it's not the same. Not the same at all.
Still, the benefits of FB, particularly to a person in exile from her Midwest homeland, have been phenomenal. I love knowing what's going on with friends and having the most recent pics of my nieces and nephews. I love realizing that people I dismissed in high school are actually pretty cool and have unexpectedly lefty politics. Even the conservatives have cute babies. I don't de-friend anyone on the basis of politics because I think that, red state or blue state, we should all be forced to look at pictures of each others' kids. It's a divided nation without a doubt, but I refuse to participate in further divisions. FB is a big chaotic mess of links and comments and likes and stories and images and book reviews and chats and jokes, and I love it. I love it all.
But let's see what happens if I give it up for awhile. Lent will be here tomorrow, and I'm enough of a Catholic to take advantage of a six week hiatus from stuff I should be cutting back on anyway. It just so happens that Lent coincides with what will be one of the most intense writing periods of my life. The book manuscript, she will come due. And the first 100 pages need to be done by Easter.
I'm also going to try to stop eating ice cream straight from the container when I wake up at 3:00 a.m., but patience, grasshoppers.
The Sunday dispensation from Lenten resolutions is controversial in some circles, but I want to have it as an option. Other than Sunday, I'll be abstaining from the crackbook and writing whatever observations I can't bear not sharing on the Internet right here. Maybe I'll even get this blog up and running, who knows? In any case, I'll be posting about my progress and checking in once a week.
In addition to writing blog posts and writing book chapters, I will also try to hang out with some actual Angelenos. There are plenty of people that I would like to get to know better. Well OK, not plenty, but enough to occupy a shy type like me for six weeks. And if I keep bombing? More blog fodder, or Sunday FB fodder. But I'm counting on you to keep me honest.
See you at the poetry reading, bitches.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Two Girls, Fat and Thin
At breakfast in the cafeteria today, I was reading an article bemoaning the obesity of contemporary Americans, when I discovered the fun fact that the average female weight in the U.S. is 165. For a beautiful five seconds or so, I basked in the knowledge that I was average---AVERAGE! Not fat--until I realized that the whole point of the 165 statistic was "can you believe it? The average American woman weighs 165 lbs! That's what a bunch of lard asses we are in the United States." Bubble burst, I sulked and continued stuffing my face with cinnamon chocolate cream cheese coffee cake. There was no way that article was going to ruin my breakfast.
I have weighed a lot more than 165, and I have weighed at lot less. In my early twenties, when I often forgot to eat and lived on Diet Coke and cigarettes, I weighed 95 lbs. Friends would whisper amongst one another, worriedly. "Does she know she's skinny? Is she anorexic?" Yes, I knew it. My elbows were razor sharp weapons and my neck was an alarming canvas of veins and tendons. Was I anorexic? No. Unless being an idiot and only eating Cheetos and Taco Bell every three days constitutes an eating disorder. I was skinny because my dad was skinny, because my metabolism was that of a coked up gerbil, because I didn't eat anything nutritious, because I smoked. You couldn't find a less virtuous thin person than I was in 1992.
At the height of my depression several years back, I weighed close to 200 lbs. I was a miserable couch potato that ate and drank her feelings, whose only exercise was pushing the elevator buttons and raising her beer stein. I watched a lot of television. I spent a lot of time on the Internet. I read articles about how I should love my body no matter what its shape or size, about how some dudes dig fat chicks, about how womanly curves were sexy. I learned that weight was not a moral issue. I learned that my skinny friends were totally fat-positive. All these attempts to bolster my self esteem were for naught--I was miserable. I hated my self and my life, and it was especially aggravating not to be able to find any pants that fit.
Over the past year, I've changed my lifestyle significantly. I've given up alcohol, and made a conscious effort to eat more kale. I run about two miles three times a week. I try to climb stairs whenever possible. I'm off a troublesome medication that I'm pretty sure helped me be "less active" and more fat in the first place. So my weight has gone down, but slowly. I still eat crappy food sometimes and I eat a hell of a lot of sweets. I am no longer miserable. I am without a doubt more virtuous with regard to my health and diet. And yet, I am not thin by any stretch of the imagination.
Do I wish I weighed less and were thinner? Well, in a word, yes. I do. My fat-positive skinny friends want me to embrace health and not scale numbers, and I know they are right. At the same time, I still carry around a fair amount of self-loathing and shame because HELLO have you taken a look at what our culture does to women, let alone fat women? To love one's body no matter its size or shape is a tall order when you are not thin, and no amount of fat positivity expressed by friends will make it better. In fact, it sometimes feels callous, like "why don't you love your body? You should love your body! Look at me, I love my body, and you can too if you only just try hard enough." Loving your body when you are fat requires being a fat positive warrior every day in a culture that systematically shames you. Some days you don't feel like it. Some days, in fact, you'd rather laugh about it and make jokes about the size of your ass. Because that ass is hilarious, actually.
The Louie episode where Sarah Baker schools Louis CK about fat women is one of the few cultural interventions that gets it right. It is ridiculous (and sexist) that fat men get to complain about being fat while fat women are expected to be all earnest and fat positive, or else call the suicide prevention line. My ass is fat. It is funny, because I can run and eat all the kale I want, and it is always the same. While it makes an outstanding cushion in the bleacher seats, it's also extremely difficult to clad in jeans. I don't like my ass a lot of the time, but I find it funny. Also, there is nothing wrong with my self esteem. Just because I make fun of my own ass does not mean I hate myself. In fact, I have too much self esteem because I honestly believe that I am so hilarious and hardworking and kick ass that I DESERVE cake and ice cream.
It's all relative, of course. While I'm a stone cold fox in my Iowa hometown, I'm the "fat mommy" in west LA. All of the midriff baring athletic types in Madison have an adorable beer and cheese curd baby cascading over the band of their running shorts. Any one of us might be considered skinny or fat in different contexts. Skinny sistern, we do seriously love you guys. It is awesome that you dig our fat breasts. We will flash them at you any time you ask. You can watch t.v. while laying your cute bony skull on our curves every night if you want to. The thing is, we know you love us. We make you look even skinnier! (Kidding...kidding.) No, you love us because we are funny and smart and kind and throw great parties and read great books and entertain you. We are awesome. Of course you love us. We love us too! And dessert. We really, really love dessert. And you, of course. We love you.
But let us bitch about being fat every now and again. Because it's so stupid it's funny. Losing weight is utterly ridiculous and has nothing to do with self esteem or even healthy habits. I eat so much dessert it's ridiculous and the scale doesn't move either up or down. I had a hot dog last night and was four pounds heavier this morning. Nothing makes sense or computes. I gave up sugar and gained weight. I returned to eating sugar and lost weight. I ate little but kale for weeks and only lost a pound. I can run every day and it does absolutely nothing for my weight...though it is great for my depression. In any case, you either have to laugh or complain, and both are more fun and less tedious than trying to love our bodies just the way they are.
It's not to say we won't get there. But (at least for now) fat ladies are on a different trip than thin ladies, with ice cream roadblocks and body-shaming billboards every few feet. It would be nice to switch paths with y'all thin mofos sometime, but since it ain't gonna happen, let's just shout jokes across the median strip at one another.
And throw us some donuts! Because we deserve them.
I have weighed a lot more than 165, and I have weighed at lot less. In my early twenties, when I often forgot to eat and lived on Diet Coke and cigarettes, I weighed 95 lbs. Friends would whisper amongst one another, worriedly. "Does she know she's skinny? Is she anorexic?" Yes, I knew it. My elbows were razor sharp weapons and my neck was an alarming canvas of veins and tendons. Was I anorexic? No. Unless being an idiot and only eating Cheetos and Taco Bell every three days constitutes an eating disorder. I was skinny because my dad was skinny, because my metabolism was that of a coked up gerbil, because I didn't eat anything nutritious, because I smoked. You couldn't find a less virtuous thin person than I was in 1992.
At the height of my depression several years back, I weighed close to 200 lbs. I was a miserable couch potato that ate and drank her feelings, whose only exercise was pushing the elevator buttons and raising her beer stein. I watched a lot of television. I spent a lot of time on the Internet. I read articles about how I should love my body no matter what its shape or size, about how some dudes dig fat chicks, about how womanly curves were sexy. I learned that weight was not a moral issue. I learned that my skinny friends were totally fat-positive. All these attempts to bolster my self esteem were for naught--I was miserable. I hated my self and my life, and it was especially aggravating not to be able to find any pants that fit.
Over the past year, I've changed my lifestyle significantly. I've given up alcohol, and made a conscious effort to eat more kale. I run about two miles three times a week. I try to climb stairs whenever possible. I'm off a troublesome medication that I'm pretty sure helped me be "less active" and more fat in the first place. So my weight has gone down, but slowly. I still eat crappy food sometimes and I eat a hell of a lot of sweets. I am no longer miserable. I am without a doubt more virtuous with regard to my health and diet. And yet, I am not thin by any stretch of the imagination.
Do I wish I weighed less and were thinner? Well, in a word, yes. I do. My fat-positive skinny friends want me to embrace health and not scale numbers, and I know they are right. At the same time, I still carry around a fair amount of self-loathing and shame because HELLO have you taken a look at what our culture does to women, let alone fat women? To love one's body no matter its size or shape is a tall order when you are not thin, and no amount of fat positivity expressed by friends will make it better. In fact, it sometimes feels callous, like "why don't you love your body? You should love your body! Look at me, I love my body, and you can too if you only just try hard enough." Loving your body when you are fat requires being a fat positive warrior every day in a culture that systematically shames you. Some days you don't feel like it. Some days, in fact, you'd rather laugh about it and make jokes about the size of your ass. Because that ass is hilarious, actually.
The Louie episode where Sarah Baker schools Louis CK about fat women is one of the few cultural interventions that gets it right. It is ridiculous (and sexist) that fat men get to complain about being fat while fat women are expected to be all earnest and fat positive, or else call the suicide prevention line. My ass is fat. It is funny, because I can run and eat all the kale I want, and it is always the same. While it makes an outstanding cushion in the bleacher seats, it's also extremely difficult to clad in jeans. I don't like my ass a lot of the time, but I find it funny. Also, there is nothing wrong with my self esteem. Just because I make fun of my own ass does not mean I hate myself. In fact, I have too much self esteem because I honestly believe that I am so hilarious and hardworking and kick ass that I DESERVE cake and ice cream.
It's all relative, of course. While I'm a stone cold fox in my Iowa hometown, I'm the "fat mommy" in west LA. All of the midriff baring athletic types in Madison have an adorable beer and cheese curd baby cascading over the band of their running shorts. Any one of us might be considered skinny or fat in different contexts. Skinny sistern, we do seriously love you guys. It is awesome that you dig our fat breasts. We will flash them at you any time you ask. You can watch t.v. while laying your cute bony skull on our curves every night if you want to. The thing is, we know you love us. We make you look even skinnier! (Kidding...kidding.) No, you love us because we are funny and smart and kind and throw great parties and read great books and entertain you. We are awesome. Of course you love us. We love us too! And dessert. We really, really love dessert. And you, of course. We love you.
But let us bitch about being fat every now and again. Because it's so stupid it's funny. Losing weight is utterly ridiculous and has nothing to do with self esteem or even healthy habits. I eat so much dessert it's ridiculous and the scale doesn't move either up or down. I had a hot dog last night and was four pounds heavier this morning. Nothing makes sense or computes. I gave up sugar and gained weight. I returned to eating sugar and lost weight. I ate little but kale for weeks and only lost a pound. I can run every day and it does absolutely nothing for my weight...though it is great for my depression. In any case, you either have to laugh or complain, and both are more fun and less tedious than trying to love our bodies just the way they are.
It's not to say we won't get there. But (at least for now) fat ladies are on a different trip than thin ladies, with ice cream roadblocks and body-shaming billboards every few feet. It would be nice to switch paths with y'all thin mofos sometime, but since it ain't gonna happen, let's just shout jokes across the median strip at one another.
And throw us some donuts! Because we deserve them.
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