I grew up looking like a string bean. All I ever wished for on my birthday were boobies and an apple butt (or any butt). I really can eat anything I want and stay pretty skinny. This sounds nice until the teenage me started obsessing on knobby knees and elbows and my best buddy in high school was a very curvy girl named Tara with the most bountiful boobies in the whole school. She lived 3 houses down from me and had a swimming pool. We would invite boys from school over and then lounge around the pool in our skimpiest of string bikinis; I like Ichabod Crane and Tara like Marilyn Monroe. Not really very good for the ol’ ego.
Years later, when I got pregnant with Ella, people said “You look great now that you’ve put on a little weight!” I knew it too. I could see the boobies I’d wished for on every birthday candle growing right before me. The boob fairy finally came. By the time Ella had grown her full 8 pounds in utero I had gained 80. I was hovering right around 200 lbs. and feeling positively voluptuous. It took 2 years to loose my curves. I don’t think I’ll ever be Ichabod Crane thin again, but still thin. The apple butt slid right into apple sauce. The thing is I never really tried; I just chased Ella around the house and the usual. This brings me to “50 Habits of Naturally Thin People” in this months Reader’s Digest.
I don’t even know why I still get this magazine, are the jokes really worth it? This article has some pretty nonrealistic ideas. Let me tell you I NEVER sit in traffic squeezing my buttocks together, I don’t do squats while brushing my teeth and I never wore a 10lb bag of sugar in a back pack while I ran errands. I don’t know any naturally skinny people who would. Mostly I’ve been trying to put on weight my whole life. I got to thinking - what are my habits that might lend to being naturally skinny? I know a few people who are trying to loose and it seems everybody’s looking for the Holy Grail of skinny. So here’s what I came up with.
1) I rarely drink pop and when I do it’s 7up
2) I only eat meat when I can recognize what part of the animal it is, i.e. “yep, that’s a chunk of cow butt”, or “Hey, look a chicken breast, yummy” if it’s ground up there might be a chance I could get a piece of gristle and ruin my appetite for meat for a week.
3) I run up and down the stairs at least 10 times a day because I forgot something
4) When I crave chocolate, I drink hot chocolate (cause it’s the only chocolate that lasts for any amount of time in our house)
5) I bake food (Cause it’s easier to throw it in the oven than to stand over the stove frying)
6) I shiver for 4 months out of every year
7) Sometimes I have just a couple of candy bars for lunch
8) I drink wine often
9) I put garlic on everything
10) I talk with my hands (it’s the Italian in me)
Ok, no doubt somebody is thinking “You stupid wench, I do all those things and I run 4 miles and I eat bird food all day and it’s not working, you don’t know how good you have it.” My answer to them is, I find you irresistible! I look at Queen Latifah and think wow, that’s a great shape! I, like many men, am memorized by cleavage and I really love when a woman has a dimple on her elbow instead of a boney ol’ chicken wing. I adore smooth skin and bigger ladies have it longer than their skinny mummy-like counterparts. I love the look of hips, I mean bountiful hips in tight jeans. So much better than sitting in someone’s lap and hearing them say “your butt bone is digging into my leg, you have to get up.”
Ok, I guess the real message here is we should all be happy that this is a worry in our lives, we could be dealing with worse.
6 comments:
I must say my dearest Green Bean, that you look better in a pair of jeans and tight shirt than most people I know. I agree with preferring curves. My kid sister complains that she's "fat" and it breaks my heart, her body is beautiful. Too thin is very child like to me, and I am wary of men who like their "woman" to look like that. Equally scary are rail thin women with large breast implants. When did unnatural become appealing (to some)?
While I will admit, vanity is a part of my desire to lose weight it's not my only motivation. I look forward to dancing with The Casseroles and not feeling out of breath after one and half songs, taking the kids on a hike and not wanting to collapse because my thighs and shins are burning.
I think back to the last time I felt healthy (or "thin") and it was not when I was in a size 2 or even a size 6. I was a volumptuous size 14 and felt like a million bucks. That's my goal...size 14. It may not be what some consider thin or healthy, but it is for me.
I understand the healthy part. It's the reason I didn't put into my list of skinny habits - 'smoking'. It may make you skinny but it'll also make ya dead.
That never worked for me. I was overweight when I smoked a pack a day.
reader's digest: i read it growing up as a kid and even called it "reader's diarrhea" when i was very little -- people keep it in the bathroom, after all.
it's an ok mag. i just finished a free year's subscription, so reading it was nostalgic, but i wouldn't go out of my way to read it.
You have not lost your curves you dope. My Mom actually called me that today. You have great boobs. I prefer "breast", that's me. Even with my giant weight gain, the Bust Fairy never visited. She never will. The best to do is love what you got, cause, it's yours. And your brain KNOWS if you are dissin' it's package. HOLLA!
yes, weird mood today. :)
I almost snorted cottage cheese (my midnight snacky)out of my nose when I read that last line. Thank you ktj
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