Last night one of my roommates and I were discussing our childhood idea of “the perfect body.” She and I are both well-endowed in the chest area, but breasts are something I have never really wanted.
“You mean you never wanted big tits?” she asked incredulously. “What sort of pop culture were you exposed to as a kid?”
Cartoons, mostly. But cartoons aren’t really sexualised and the reason I never really thought about growing up was because growing up meant having to deal with the icky issue of sexuality. Of course, it’s not icky at all, but my “ideal” body was essentially that of a child, but taller. (Essentially, this meant I wanted to grow up to be Dolores Haze.) I wonder if any of this has to do with the fact that I was never ostracized in elementary or middle school. I never in my life ever hated who I was (I’ve hated the way I looked, but I never thought the way I looked had any effect on who I was) because no one ever hurt me or picked on me.
“Mum,” I wailed, “I will never be a great writer because I never had a tormented childhood!”
“Good,” she replied, “Then go to business school and make lots of money.”
I never told myself, When I grow-up, this will all be better. In fact, life was pretty damn good at seven. It’s been going steadily downhill since (not really).
My doctor told me the other day that I need to lose thirty-five pounds for a variety of reasons. First, my knee can’t take it. I already have arthritis and a change in the weather will result in a twinge in my knee (“The old war wound’s acting up again!”). Second, unlike most girls who carry/gain weight around their breasts/hips/thighs, my fat settles in my mid-section, which puts me at a higher risk for diabetes and heart disease. Third (although this reason is purely my own), I want to get back to that narrow-hipped, flat-chested ideal.
When I was sixteen, I went from an A-cup to a C-cup in a month. The other girls my age were stuffing their bras and worrying about whether or not someone will find them attractive while I was reveling in all my flat-chested glory. Sometimes it’s no wonder that fantasy is my genre; I exist on my own plane of existence. (I am Ally Sheedy’s character from The Breakfast Club.) I’ve always felt disproportionate to myself: I have narrow hips and athletic legs with what I perceive to be ginormous boobs. Clearly, if you’re going by my lower half, I ought to be of a wiry, tomboyish build. If you’re going by my upper half, I ought to be six inches taller with child-bearing hips. I prefer the former to the latter. I never liked the trope of the fertile and sexually attractive woman; my patron goddess as a child (because I decided I was going to have one in the fourth grade) was Artemis, the eternal virgin.
Thirty-five pounds. I can do it.
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