Fat Fat Fatty

I’ve always had a problem or two with my weight. I’ve never been one of those people that both disgust you and force you to take pity on them, but I’ve never been quite content with the size of my jeans or what belt notch I was using at any given time. I suppose I could always be a bit slimmer. Not abs of steel slimmer, just less… I don’t know, bulgy.

My weight seems to come and go like the tide throughout the year, which I suppose is the case for most people. During the fall months, I always feel fairly confident in myself and wear t-shirts that didn’t fit a few months earlier. However, by the time that Christmas comes around I cram myself full of Smithfield ham like I need the extra layers of fat to survive hibernation. Sadly, I tend to stay this way well into Spring and early Summer, when I finally decide to stop eating everything that I see and try to become one of those people that actually enjoys exercising and healthy living. Assuming that they actually exist, of course.

Whenever I see someone gaily jogging past me on the sidewalk, or on the off chance that I actually go to the gym see someone lifting weights while screaming at themselves in the mirror I always become overwhelmingly puzzled. What the fuck is wrong with these people? What could be driving these people to put themselves through such torture? I understand having low self-esteem but this just seems extreme. I can’t even wrestle with the idea of consistent exercise: you put your body through a heightened state of activity, working your lungs, heart, and muscles harder than what their used to, all while getting sweaty and smelly--and you tell me that it’s good for me? That can’t be right. I refuse to believe that anything as unpleasant as this whole exercise thing can’t be good for you. Has anyone actually done studies on this sort of thing? They have? Entire schools of thought you say? Well then maybe attitudes like mine are why so many fat people exist in this world.

It’s just that I’m not uncomfortable with myself to the point of actually wanting to do something drastic about it. Of course that doesn’t mean that I’m thrilled with myself either. I’m just not the type to look at myself in the mirror and feel the immediate need to start a diet consisting only of carrots and sugar packets. Although, every now and then I will stop eating fried chicken, which seems healthy enough to me.

I think there are two reasons that I’m a bit self-conscious about my waist line, the first being that I was always picked on in elementary school. Now, I’m not going to turn this into some self-pitying sob story about how nobody gave me a fair chance, and that the kids would throw rocks at me and call me Kris The Pig Fucking Fat Shit, but I acknowledge the fact that every class needs a doughy kid and that it was my job to fulfill this need. I’m just saying that spending your childhood, adolescence, and teenage years being considered the tubby friend kind of takes its toll on you.

The second reason I’m convinced is the heart of the matter: my mother has always been obsessed with her own weight. Now in order to understand this you need to understand my mother. Hanging out with my mother as a child meant that you had to become an immediate judge of other women, and my mother seems to have a radar for spotting out asses that are bigger than hers. “Kris,” she would say, “Kris. Do I look like that over there? Man look at that thing. I bet she takes up two chairs when she sits. I don’t look like that do I?”

She never has looked like that. Ever. But my mother still seems convinced to this day that she stands as the fattest woman in the grocery store, department store, restaurant, or beach. Of course, being a good son I always assure her that she does not, in fact, look like a borderline diabetic elephant seal—and I even mean it. This always puts her in a better mood, and makes me wonder what was wrong with her vision.

Still, my mother had me trained to pick out the fatties by the time that I was three, and together we treated life as if were constantly attending some sort of vaudevillian freak show. Once while in the doctor’s office with an ear infection, I loudly pointed out an oversized parent to my mother. “Mom! Mom look at the butt on that one! She’s HUUGE!”

Panicked, my mother pointed to the painting of whales on the wall and nervously agreed “Yes, Kris, but I don’t think whales have butts.”

“No mom! The lady! She’s got a big ol’ butt!” Sometimes I almost feel sorry for my parents—but then again they raised me, so ultimately anything embarrassing I did as a child is their fault.

After years of judging overweight people with my mother I think I understand where she was coming from—comparing yourself to those who look terrible compared to you makes you feel great about yourself. It doesn’t exactly get results like obsessing over someone that looks better than you does, but it does make you realize that life could be worse and that you at least look better than that schmuck whose ham thighs hang out from the bottom of his elastic waist shorts.

So while I don’t exactly have the healthiest outlook on the way that I look, but maybe I’m just a sucker for those Dove ads that promote accepting your body weight. Sure I might not be able to run very far without crashing into the bushes and dying, and I don’t really like carrots, tomatoes, celery, cucumbers, radishes, or cabbage; but at least I know where to draw the line. Because if my mother taught me one thing, it’s that fat people are gross and not to be trusted. Thanks mom!