Spotlight on Fat
"I'm fat."She's not fat. She's never been fat. Even at 5'5", 107 lbs., though, Gloria thinks she's one cheeseburger away from being asked to appear in the second Baby Got Back video. I'll occasionally catch her standing in front of the full-length mirror in our bedroom, surveying herself with the glare of Roy Cohn eyeing a witness during the McCarthy hearings.
"I'm fat," she says.
"Who do you see in there?" I ask. "HR Pufnstuf?"
"I eat too much," she says.
"You cut a peanut in half and call it a snack. Jockeys call you for diet advice. How can you be fat?"
"I'm a fat person in a thin person's body."
"Well, canvas your membership and reach a consensus on dinner, would you?"
"I'm huge," she says.
"You have fat eyes," I said. "You don't need a diet. You need an ophthalmologist. See if you can get in for some vision liposuction"
In a remarkable trick of optics, however, Gloria only sees fatness when looking into a mirror. When she sees any other woman, they are all thin and tall, with alluring features and excellent posture. Last week, we were walking through a mall and she called my attention to a woman who was crossing in front of us. This woman was wearing pants so tight that they should have been required by law to have a warning label on the back reading "LOOK OUT! SHE'S GONNA BLOW!"
"She's attractive," Gloria says.
"What? Where could you possibly be looking?" I ask.
"With the velvet top," she says. "Those jeans look good on her."
"Good? Her ass looks like it was buried alive and it's trying to claw out of the coffin before it suffocates. People with the Ass of the Undead should not be wearing those pants."
"I like those low-cut jeans," she says.
"It would be fine if her top filled the gap," I said.
"That gap is supposed to be sexy," Gloria says.
"Not exactly," I said. "It's sexy on the nine women in the country who have flat stomachs. For everyone else, it should come with a lighted sign pointing to their stomachs that flashes SPOTLIGHT ON FAT."
"Hmph," Gloria says. "You just don't understand fashion."
"This isn't fashion, it's fat," I said. "Fat I understand. Fat lacks nuance."
"Fat's not the only one," she says. She's good. I love her.
After a few seconds of walking, I point into the distance. "Do you see that?" I ask.
"What?"
"It's the celery stick stand," I said. "We can get you a snack. Maybe you can go wild and get a potato tendril."
I'm not sure when we're going to the mall again.
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