I'm not sure where it comes from but suddenly, out of nowhere, I feel like I'm a
cupcake away from obesity. As I mentally make note to have my sofa reinforced
and doorways widened, I wonder how I can possibly be the same girl as I was a
few hours ago, running sprints at boot camp -- lithe, lean and quick in a slashed
scrap of a t-shirt and sprayed-on leggings. The shift occurs in an instant, a
kindly meant yet misguided adjective, a minute shift up the scales, an almost
imperceptible tightening of the waistband can turn the tables mentally, and it is
a rare and lucky creature that has never experienced it.
Whether the porkiness be the result of a few too many greedy dinners,
summertime rosé bloat or just a figment of one's imagination, it creeps up when
one is least expecting it. It could of course be much worse -- imagine being a
celebrity and having every tabloid proclaiming your worst fears and your body
image hang-ups on the front of every weekly rag. It would be enough to drive me
to cake. (I'd probably close the curtains, unplug the phone and sit home with Ben
& Jerry's wearing my pajamas watching daytime television)
There are legendary stories flying around about us stylists cutting labels out of
dresses for our clients because they won't wear a dress that is bigger than a size
zero. This, by the way, I have not and will not do -- I maintain that sizing is entirely
arbitrary and just to be used as a guide, rather like navigating by the North Star
instead of satellite-guided GPS. What always perplexes me is getting a starlet's
measurements and then arriving for the fitting or shoot and realizing that the
only place the zero will fit is on somebody else. It's astonishing that a young lady
lauded for her beauty and envious figure would feel the need to tell fibs about her
dimensions, and yet we all do it. It's a number, a category, something to judge
ourselves with, a box to confine us. We are all sums of many parts, not easily
compartmentalized by adjectives or numbers. I've been called many things --
voluptuous, chesty, zaftig, robust and healthy. The truth of it is that I've never felt
like any of these words, and it is vastly uncomfortable to have a label.
Bearing this in mind, the best diet is a little mental re-alignment rather than
resorting to a juice fast or two pairs of Spanx, to embrace one's self as a divine
feminine curvy vixen rather than a pig in a wig. Witness the creamy volupté
of Elizabeth Taylor, possibly the ultimate poster-girl for how gorgeous a little
padding really can look. She ate, she drank, she got married frequently and wore
divine jewelry. In short, she really enjoyed her life and her appearance reflected
that. If one thinks about some of the other icons of gorgeousness such as Marilyn
Monroe, Scarlett Johansson, Lara Stone, Brigitte Bardot or Beyoncé and realize
that that velvet coating of squidge that we all do daily battle with is the very
essence of what it is to be feminine.