10. my friends
This one says: ‘fuck, I have gotten so FAT!’
This one says: ‘I can’t go to the lecture with you - I have to go to
the gym, I had a pastry this morning.’
This one says: ‘Well, it’s good to see you not looking so porny these
days. I guess you’re getting hassled less now that you’re back down here with
the rest of us.’
This one says: ‘No, she’s just shy – she doesn’t talk to anyone. It’s
not a sexual competition thing,’ and without pointing out how he is complicit in
the dynamic I can’t say a word; so sometimes, I don’t, and sometimes, I
do.
This one says: ‘I’m glad you’re eating again, but don’t gain too much
back!’
This one says: ‘I just don’t even want to date or have sex any more,
it’s too hard navigating all this shit,’ and I say: ‘I hear you.’
This one says: ‘God, look at her, she’s beautiful,’ and I say: ‘Yes,
she is, she looks like you,’ and she says: ‘No, I’m huge, way bigger than she
is, and she carries it off.’
This one says: ‘You could land a 747 on my ass these days,’ and another
one laughs, and says: ‘Mine, too,’ and I say: ‘That’s crazy talk, stop gauging
yourself that way, it’s not funny,’ and the first one looks at me levelly and
says: ‘Who are YOU to talk, pipsqueak?’ and I say again: ‘Not funny, quit it,
you are lovely and I’m not having any other conversation than that with you,’
and she says: ‘Okay, okay, you have a point – you could not land a 747 on my
ass. A 727 would have no problem, though.’
This one says: ‘Well, you wear makeup sometimes, you have long hair,
what do you expect?’ Another adds: ‘The people I hang out with don’t care about
all that, so it’s not really an issue.’ Another says: ‘I don’t want to sound
like I’m victim-blaming, BUT…’ and goes on at great length doing just that,
about large women and small women both.
This one says: ‘I used to worry about all that, but now I’m not
affected by it.’
This one says: ‘I can’t help who I’m attracted to.’
This one says: ‘She’s just not taking care of herself,’ and I say:
‘Yeah, YOU’VE really LET YOURSELF GO, too, are those LOVE-HANDLES I see? God,
you must feel subhuman,’ and he laughs uncomfortably, and says: ‘Well, I’m a
man, it’s not such an issue for me,’ and I say: ‘Exactly.’
This one says: ‘Your expectations are so high. You’re right, of course,
absolutely right about patriarchy, feminism, all this stuff you write about, but
I worry for you,’ and I don’t know what to say, because she’s right: I do pay a
high personal price for my involuntarily high awareness of these dynamics, these
undercurrents, these cultural damages.
I would be happier if I was dumber, less awake, more in denial.
But I wouldn’t change it.
This one says: ‘God, I feel GOOD in my skin today,’ and I say:
‘Excellent, rock on,’ and I think: May it last.
Please, let it last for at least a little while.
Give her that one huge thing.
This one pushes her salad around on her plate to make it look like
she’s eating. Later, she eats an entire box of cookies in a white explosion of
rage against killing herself. Maybe she pukes it up later, or takes diuretics.
Maybe not. Maybe she eats all the time, AT you, and gains some kind of
invisibility that feels protective even as she loathes herself and her world.
Maybe she feels exposed. Maybe she’s sick of the entire topic of conversation,
and how much importance it has, but of all the wrong kinds. Maybe she starves.
Maybe she drives off the road. Maybe she hides in her skin, her clothes, her
house. Maybe she rejects you first. Maybe she hates your guts. Maybe she wishes
you understood. Maybe she knows you never will. Maybe she just doesn’t care
anymore, she’s too damned tired.
She says nothing at all.
xo,
C
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