Adorable, Et Al. (A Fat Femme’s Guide to Managing Pesky Adjectives)
So, I’m home from yet another amazing Women’s Week. Each time I go, I’m in awe of the community of writers and editors and readers who come together to mingle, have fun, learn, and celebrate lesbian fiction. It fills my cup in more ways than I can count.
This year brought more of the same, but a new layer. Newly out of a relationship, I tried to embrace a flirtier, sassier side of myself. It went well, I’d say. Mostly. A couple of misfires, but that’s to be expected. Especially when wine is part of the equation. But there were surprises, too.
Here’s the thing. I’m a reasonably confident person. I feel pretty comfortable owning that I possess above-average intelligence. I’m funny. I’m a decent writer and a damn good cook. I rock my day job like a boss. When people say nice things about those aspects of my personality, I might get a little bashful, but I can soak it up, be gracious, and say thank you.
But. There’s always a but, isn’t there?
I don’t know if it was my attempt to channel my inner sassy, or maybe the fact that I’ve been feeling better in my body (thanks, barre), or what, but this year I got another slate of adjectives. Ones I’m not used to. Ones I’m not sure what to do with.
Over the course of the week, I got adorable, pretty, and even a gorgeous. Now, adorable is tricky, but that’s another post. The point is that more than one person conveyed to me that I was attractive. Like, physically.
On one hand, declaring this in a blog post feels massively vain, but I hope you’ll bear with me. Because writing blog posts helps me process feelings. More importantly, I’ve come to realize that if I’m wrestling with shit, I’m never the only one. If flinging this out into the ether resonates with one other person, well then, it’s worth it.
So, back to those pesky adjectives. That P one, or the G one. Or, look out, the B one. For me, they’re really, really, like seriously fucking really, hard to believe. My general go-to is the they’re-just-being-nice interpretation. That’s actually an improvement over the they-feel-sorry-for-me interpretation. And maybe comparable to the oh-that’s-nice-they-don’t-hate-fat-girls interpretation.
I know. I’m obnoxious. I can recite the fat-positive playbook. If one of my friends uttered such nonsense, I’d give her a very stern talking to. But what happens in the overactive recesses of my mind generally stays there, to be fretted over a million times, in the comfort of my self-doubt.
Not today. I am putting it out there now, but please don’t feel like you have to give me the talk. I know. (Really.) I’m mostly marveling at the whole thing and trying to sort out how one might go about the believing it and the soaking it in. I’d happily take pointers on that front if you have them.
My current strategy is fake it ’til I make it. Oh, and resist the urge to say something dismissive even if I’m hella uncomfortable because that’s just rude.
I’m also happy, as I said, to fling my discomfort into world in the hopes it helps someone else know they’re not alone. If that’s you–today, this week, your whole life–I feel you. And you’re gorgeous.
