Mon 31 Jan 2011
No, Fatties (Part 1)
Posted by ShazamChi under True Story.
1 Comment
I grew up with an obese mother. An obese mother who was, by evidence I observed as a child, not ashamed of her body. She was often naked – she slept naked and conducted many household activities naked. She had many, many lovers who seemed to like her obese body. Years after I moved out and was visiting her with a friend of mine, the friend and I made too much noise and woke my mother. My mother – who slept naked, remember – and I proceeded to have a horrible fight – I called her a cunt – in front of my friend, all while she was naked.
I don’t know how much my mother weighed, but it was upwards of 200 lbs on her 5’3″ frame. She was always fat. She claimed she gained the weight when she got pregnant with my sister, who is four years older than me. “Baby” weight does not stay on for more than 30 years, but she went with it.
From the time my mother and father broke up when I was four until my mother’s 50s she had a number of lovers, all but one of them women. I know this because my mother was very open with me regarding her sex life. Very open: When I was eight she explained to me what a climax was. I didn’t fully understand, but I do recall being horrified that she was explaining it to me as she lie in bed – naked. (No, there was not any inappropriate touching.) And she’s the one who called her lovers “lovers,” a word that still makes me cringe.
The one area where it was obvious my mother was not comfortable with her weight – or, more accurately, with the weight of others – was food service. She found it repulsive to have her food prepared and/or served by a fat person. The irony was that any food she ate at home was both prepared and served by a fat person.
I remember being embarrassed about my mother when I was young. I didn’t want her to pick me up at school even when she could, which was rare because she worked. I didn’t want her to volunteer for class trips either. And it was because she was fat.
When I was 11 I moved in with my father and step-mother, both of whom were thin, fit people. I didn’t want my step-mother to pick me up from school or volunteer for class trips – not that she would have – not because she was fat but because she looked mean. Truthfully, my step-mother reminded me of Mrs. Olsen on “Little House on the Prairie” complete with a sour puss and hair pulled back into a severe bun.
Living with my father and step-mother, I heard – a lot – about how I took after my mother physically and my sister took after our father because I was short and chubby and my sister was tall and thin. Us kids were encouraged to exercise – both my sister and step-sister had been involved in dance – and eat well – every single dinner included protein, starch, and vegetables in proportions that today would seem a little heavy on the meat and the starch, but that at the time my step-mother was learning about nutrition were what was considered healthy. When I was a child a soda was considered a special treat, and we were allowed to watch only an hour of television per day except on very special occasions. This is all to say that I know exercise is good, proper nutrition is good, and sloth is bad.
To be continued.
I swear. True story.