by KATE FRIDKIS
When I was really skinny, people were always telling me about it.
“You’re so skinny!”
Just in case I’d forgotten.
Sometimes they said it like a compliment. As though if you peeled those words back the words underneath would say “you’re so beautiful.”
Sometimes they said it like they were sort of pissed off at me. Like, who did I think I was, being skinny like that?
Sometimes they said it and then they said, “You need to eat something. I’m worried.” And looked all worried.
I learned that I was skinny through other girls and women constantly pointing it out. Until I was told what I looked like for the thousandth or so time, I actually hadn’t given my weight any thought. And then it turned out that I was skinny. Which was probably due mostly to my metabolism and partly to the fact that my parents cooked vegetables from my mom’s garden and chicken (always chicken! Unless it was, please, please no, fish. Ugh) for dinner.
It turned out that I was skinny. But more to the point, it turned out that being skinny was important. It said something meaningful about me.
And it continued to say all sorts of important and meaningful things about me, right up into college, when I could eat sugary cereal at ANY TIME, for any meal. It meant “at LEAST you’re skinny” when I didn’t feel pretty. And “skinny IS pretty” when I felt that everything else about me wasn’t that attractive.
And “you must be a runner” to the people who attributed it to discipline and activeness, neither of which are words that really describe me at all. It meant “sexy” sometimes. “Better.” It meant “you’d better not get heavier.” It meant “why are you better than me?” from some women. It meant “you don’t deserve it” from others. It meant “why do you think you’re better than me?” from even more.