I logged on to my email yesterday and scanned the subject lines:
“We’d love to come to brunch.”
“Are you getting excited?”
“Fwd: Notes for Chapter.”
“Jill, do you want to drop 12 pounds by Friday.”
The last one gave me pause. Damn my mother, she’ll try anything. So I promptly called her cell phone and when she said hello, without breathing, I said, “NO, I DO NOT WANT TO DROP 12 POUNDS BY FRIDAY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. I’M JUST FINE THE WAY I AM! GEEZ!”
“O-kay…” She sounds tenuous, always good when it comes to the subject of my weight.
“That’s it?”
“That’s it, sweetie. I really have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Didn’t you send me an email about losing 12 pounds? It’s got all your markings. It’s direct, abrasive and expertly passive aggressive.”
“No, in fact, daddy just called Bruce to come and fix our computer. Our email is broken.”
“You mean it’s down.”
“Whatever.”
Wait a minute, I’m supposed to be saying that, whatever. What’s going on here? Suddenly, I feel like Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.
“Hold on.” I click on the email now in question, beckoning to me like a spinach pizza and a fountain soda.
“Revolutionary new Hoodia can help you lose weight. Click here.” The “click here” is flashing in red, while an unsubscribe clause sits quietly in .1 type at the bottom.
Shit. “Sorry mom.”
“Wait, can I get that on tape?”
“Ha ha. Oops, there’s my other line.” Not really, but I hang up anyway. I can’t worry about her right now. I’ve got bigger fish to fry. Like the fact that my brain is no longer able to process the obvious. Does being a month away from a wedding do this to everybody? Or is it just me and my raging mid-life hormones? (Then again, I blame the Fed’s rise in interest rates on my hormones.)
Then it dawns on me. I’m simply under-caffeinated. I rush to the bathroom where I find a practically full cup of coffee next to the sink. Must’ve forgotten about it after brushing my teeth. Whew! I go downstairs and brew up some hazelnut. Soon enough, I’ll be just fine. I just know it.
——————————–
So my friend Jonathan wants to revive my dead fish of a novel. In a nutshell, I expelled a great deal of blood and sweat working a harrowing full-time job in Chicago while simultaneously maintaining a life and writing an entire novel. Three hundred and fifty pages, if you must know (okay, double spaced, get off me).
It’s about an overweight woman and her overbearing mother (not the slightest bit autobiographical) and the editors who told me my book “wasn’t right for their house” felt that these characters were too “pathetic” and “mean.” I don’t know, to me, they were simply real.
Anyway, my agent couldn’t sell the puppy so I shoved it in a drawer and drank myself silly (four sips of cheap Merlot and a McDonald’s milkshake a day) to forget about it. Since then, I’ve accepted its demise and moved on to start a second novel and, frankly, a whole new life.
Until, that is, my very skilled and publishing-savvy friend Jonathan suggested he’d read it, provide input, and help me refine it so it’d appeal to his high-powered New York agent—a woman with, apparently, all the right editorial contacts. Not to mention a great sales record and a clear eye for talent.
With Jonathan behind me, it’s clear I’m on the road to a three-book deal, a large advance, great prosperity, thin knees, an entirely new handbag collection, apologies from all those who’ve scorned me, and worldwide acclaim. Even though all he said was, “Give it to me. I’ll see what I can do.” But hey, this writer’s imagination is vivid by necessity.
So now that “Fat Girl in a Poncho” is out of the bag, and intention is floating around the stratosphere like the chub around my biceps, neurosis has begun to set in. I don’t want to be disappointed again. Yet, I am, at the same time, intrigued to see how it will all turn out. (Will I rewrite to commercial success or won’t I? Will I receive a Pulitzer or won’t I?) Along with worrying about looking like an irridescent whale on my wedding day, I now vacillate between horror and excitement over the book.
As if yanking a dusty manuscript out of the antique pie hutch that doubles for Dan’s closet isn’t enough. I got an email the day, after Jonathan and I spoke, from an editor at Shape Magazine. Her name is Sarah. Nice girl. No, I’m not next month’s cover subject. (But good question—and yes, it would have been nice to been asked.)
Back in 2002, I was Shape’s Weight Loss Diarist (see “http://www.findarticles.com/p/search?tb=art&qt=%22Jill+Sherer%22 for some samples), where I took six million readers on my journey to get fit in a monthly column. Yep, six million people across the globe know how much I weigh. (Thank goodness, there’s no life to speak of at the International Space Station.)
And now, Sarah is working on an article for Shape’s December issue that catches up with the four Weight Loss Diarists they’ve featured in the long history of their magazine—me being one of them. The oldest and the wisest, I suspect. Well, okay, the oldest.
“Readers are always writing in asking what happened to you guys!” she says on the telephone. “So we finally decided to tell them.”
What did happen to us? I mean, my experience with Shape Magazine was magical. Even though I thought upon taking the gig that it’d be the end of my already shaky esteem, since part of the job was putting my weight in print. At that point, I didn’t even know what that number was. I was blissfully ignorant.
Surprisingly, ignorance turned out to be overrated and the experience healing. To be able to share the very core of my insecurities with a nation. To vent in 700 words each month about the one thing that’s dogged me for the bulk of my life. To get the most glorious feedback from readers that I wasn’t the only one struggling with my body. And that I was okay.
Now, talking to Sarah has brought it all back to me. The healing revival is loud and colorful and a little bit frightening. After, I am dreaming about looking like a circus elephant at my wedding these days. Does the vividness of memory come at the worst time or the best time? Do I really need the added the pressure of being thin for a Shape photo shoot? Or do I need the solace?
Then again, maybe I’m just overthinking it—being too hard on myself. As I share with Sarah the saga of all that’s happened since I wrote the column—the new job, city, dog, fiancé, family, perspective, demographic category, chemical composition, life—I decide I am.
It dawns on me as I speak to this friendly stranger that I can choose to be raw—what with Shape wanting to expose me to six million expectations, my rejected novel being resuscitated, and my pending and public rites of passage. Or I could choose to be exhilarated. To let all the crazy, messy, carnival-ride chaos that comes with living rest on a couple of open veins. And smile.
I’ll think I’ll go with that. After all, it is up to me, now, isn’t it?
——————————-
Last week, I went for my first fitting and my best friend Lorrie came with me for moral support. (What if the dress, after all these months, was too small? Looked bad? Wasn’t as I remembered it? Then what?) The good news is the dress was too big. The bad news is it made me look like a participant in a picnic race.
I went into the dressing room to put it on, shouting through the curtain at Lorrie, “Don’t look.”
“I’m not looking.”
“Wait until I have it all on.” Putting on a wedding dress is a little like putting on community theater. It takes some time and, typically, an amateur is running things. “Are you ready?”
“Been waitin’ for 40 years. C’mon out.”
I waddle out, lifting the skirts up over my ankles and standing on my tippy toes to slip into my Baby Phat silver crystal wedgie sandals. (Yep, I’m wearin ‘em for the wedding.) “Well?” I’m holding back tears.
She is silent.
“It looks bad, right? Like where’s my partner and the potatoes, right?”
“It’s bad.”
“I know. Shit. Dammit.”
“Okay, but Jill, that’s why you’re here. To meet with the seamstress.”
“Is she a miracle worker?”
“Let’s hope so.”
We walk into the back room where Anna is waiting for us. She takes one look at me and shakes her head. “Okay, well, you lost weight, that I can see.”
“Yes, but look.” I am frowning. One of my glorious bridal moments, ruined by a surplus of fabric.
“Okay, okay,” she says in a thick Eastern European accent, beckoning for me to stand on a platform in front of a three-way mirror. “Don’t look ahead, don’t look up, don’t look down, don’t look to the right or to the left. Close your eyes and don’t move until I tell you to.”
“O-kay. Please don’t hurt me.” I’m thinking pin pricks. Lorrie bursts out laughing.
“What’s she gonna do to you that that dress isn’t already doing?” she asks, between guffaws.
“Okay, honey, relax,” Anna says. Her voice is soothing, like finding the perfect white tee shirt.
I stand still with my eyes closed for 10 minutes while Anna performs her magic. And when I open my eyes, I am transformed from bag lady to blushing bride, a combination of silk and taffeta clinging to my body like a newborn child.
The room is silent. I start to cry. Anna smiles. Lorrie tells me I look like a model. But I am lost in my own image. Something I never thought I’d get to see–me in a wedding dress–at least while I was hyperconscious.
——————————-
My wedding dress is halter style with a deep plunging neckline. So deep, that finding a bra that won’t show at the cleavage is becoming a problem. I started with a strapless.
“You can see this,” says Anna, pointing to the piece that connects the right side of the bra to the left.
“Can you sew in a bra?”
“No.” She says it in a way that indicates I should never ask again.
“Get tape.”
As if tape is going to hold up these middle-aged 38Ds. (Sorry to be so blunt, but hey, this blog is all about honesty.)
Yet, Lorrie concurs and, with that, I proceed to purchase a pair of bra adhesives from the Victoria Secret web site. They arrive six days later in a box that’s flat like a thin notebook. This is my bra?
I go upstairs and take two oversized bandaids out of the box, which comes with instructions. Instructions for a bra? They tell me to make sure I’m completely dry and apply from the middle of the boob outward, pressing the tape down at the upper sides (just by the armpit). I try to do this standing up when I realize that gravity is not my favor and I’m virtually blind. So I go to the bedroom and lie down on my back in an attempt to get a better shot of getting under my generous endowment.
Of course, now I really can’t see a damn thing I’m doing and the adhesive is starting to wrinkle around my flesh. The dog, now curious, has decided to start sniffing around to see what these things are all about. Her hair is flying.
“Off Winnie, OFF.” Now I’m sweating. It must’ve been quite a picture (and not one for the brochure). Suffice to say, after about 20 minutes and several positions that now require the help of a chiropractor, I decide this is a two-man job. And I know just the person help.
“Ooh, pick me,” Dan says.
“NO. Not you.”
“But honey, if you don’t put those things on properly, well, I don’t like it.”
“What do you think is going to happen? My boobs are gonna fly out the sides of my dress like wings?”
“Well YES. In front of everybody. And then you’ll take off and we’ll never see you again.”
Why are men so obsessed with boobs? Really, they’re just two inconvenient pieces of extra flesh.
So I figure Lorrie is gonna have to go above and beyond on the day and tape up my breasts. And, knowing her sense of silliness and play, she’s not leave me with any dignity in the process. I can see her now, giggling, wacking them to and fro, calling in the junior bridesmaids (my nieces) for a good laugh at my expense, before deciding it’s time to get down to business.
You’d think they’d have come up with something for us larger-chested women to wear with a plunging dress, especially for our WEDDINGS. I tell ya, if we were men and we had to cradle those you-know-what’s in something for a special occasion, there’d be more options than there are digital cameras. But for us? We get tape. That’s it. TAPE. A step above duct tape, although, I’m starting to think duct tape would work better.
So now, I’m looking for a low plunging bra. And I mean low (think bellybutton). I’m taking any and all suggestions on it. So write and fast. Never have your comments been more critical.
Until next time.
  Share

I logged on to my email yesterday and scanned the subject lines:

“We’d love to come to brunch.”
“Are you getting excited?”
“Fwd: Notes for Chapter.”
“Jill, do you want to drop 12 pounds by Friday.”

The last one gave me pause. Damn my mother, she’ll try anything. So I promptly called her cell phone and when she said hello, without breathing, I said, “NO, I DO NOT WANT TO DROP 12 POUNDS BY FRIDAY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. I’M JUST FINE THE WAY I AM! GEEZ!”

“O-kay…” She sounds tenuous, always good when it comes to the subject of my weight.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it, sweetie. I really have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Didn’t you send me an email about losing 12 pounds? It’s got all your markings. It’s direct, abrasive and expertly passive aggressive.”

“No, in fact, daddy just called Bruce to come and fix our computer. Our email is broken.”

“You mean it’s down.”

“Whatever.”

Wait a minute, I’m supposed to be saying that, whatever. What’s going on here? Suddenly, I feel like Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.

“Hold on.” I click on the email now in question, beckoning to me like a spinach pizza and a fountain soda.

“Revolutionary new Hoodia can help you lose weight. Click here.” The “click here” is flashing in red, while an unsubscribe clause sits quietly in .1 type at the bottom.

Shit. “Sorry mom.”

“Wait, can I get that on tape?”

“Ha ha. Oops, there’s my other line.” Not really, but I hang up anyway. I can’t worry about her right now. I’ve got bigger fish to fry. Like the fact that my brain is no longer able to process the obvious. Does being a month away from a wedding do this to everybody? Or is it just me and my raging mid-life hormones? (Then again, I blame the Fed’s rise in interest rates on my hormones.)

Then it dawns on me. I’m simply under-caffeinated. I rush to the bathroom where I find a practically full cup of coffee next to the sink. Must’ve forgotten about it after brushing my teeth. Whew! I go downstairs and brew up some hazelnut. Soon enough, I’ll be just fine. I just know it.

——————————–

So my friend Jonathan wants to revive my dead fish of a novel. In a nutshell, I expelled a great deal of blood and sweat working a harrowing full-time job in Chicago while simultaneously maintaining a life and writing an entire novel. Three hundred and fifty pages, if you must know (okay, double spaced, get off me).

It’s about an overweight woman and her overbearing mother (not the slightest bit autobiographical) and the editors who told me my book “wasn’t right for their house” felt that these characters were too “pathetic” and “mean.” I don’t know, to me, they were simply real.

Anyway, my agent couldn’t sell the puppy so I shoved it in a drawer and drank myself silly (four sips of cheap Merlot and a McDonald’s milkshake a day) to forget about it. Since then, I’ve accepted its demise and moved on to start a second novel and, frankly, a whole new life.

Until, that is, my very skilled and publishing-savvy friend Jonathan suggested he’d read it, provide input, and help me refine it so it’d appeal to his high-powered New York agent—a woman with, apparently, all the right editorial contacts. Not to mention a great sales record and a clear eye for talent.

With Jonathan behind me, it’s clear I’m on the road to a three-book deal, a large advance, great prosperity, thin knees, an entirely new handbag collection, apologies from all those who’ve scorned me, and worldwide acclaim. Even though all he said was, “Give it to me. I’ll see what I can do.” But hey, this writer’s imagination is vivid by necessity.

So now that “Fat Girl in a Poncho” is out of the bag, and intention is floating around the stratosphere like the chub around my biceps, neurosis has begun to set in. I don’t want to be disappointed again. Yet, I am, at the same time, intrigued to see how it will all turn out. (Will I rewrite to commercial success or won’t I? Will I receive a Pulitzer or won’t I?) Along with worrying about looking like an irridescent whale on my wedding day, I now vacillate between horror and excitement over the book.

As if yanking a dusty manuscript out of the antique pie hutch that doubles for Dan’s closet isn’t enough. I got an email the day, after Jonathan and I spoke, from an editor at Shape Magazine. Her name is Sarah. Nice girl. No, I’m not next month’s cover subject. (But good question—and yes, it would have been nice to been asked.)

Back in 2002, I was Shape’s Weight Loss Diarist (see “http://www.findarticles.com/p/search?tb=art&qt=%22Jill+Sherer%22 for some samples), where I took six million readers on my journey to get fit in a monthly column. Yep, six million people across the globe know how much I weigh. (Thank goodness, there’s no life to speak of at the International Space Station.)

And now, Sarah is working on an article for Shape’s December issue that catches up with the four Weight Loss Diarists they’ve featured in the long history of their magazine—me being one of them. The oldest and the wisest, I suspect. Well, okay, the oldest.

“Readers are always writing in asking what happened to you guys!” she says on the telephone. “So we finally decided to tell them.”

What did happen to us? I mean, my experience with Shape Magazine was magical. Even though I thought upon taking the gig that it’d be the end of my already shaky esteem, since part of the job was putting my weight in print. At that point, I didn’t even know what that number was. I was blissfully ignorant.

Surprisingly, ignorance turned out to be overrated and the experience healing. To be able to share the very core of my insecurities with a nation. To vent in 700 words each month about the one thing that’s dogged me for the bulk of my life. To get the most glorious feedback from readers that I wasn’t the only one struggling with my body. And that I was okay.

Now, talking to Sarah has brought it all back to me. The healing revival is loud and colorful and a little bit frightening. After, I am dreaming about looking like a circus elephant at my wedding these days. Does the vividness of memory come at the worst time or the best time? Do I really need the added the pressure of being thin for a Shape photo shoot? Or do I need the solace?

Then again, maybe I’m just overthinking it—being too hard on myself. As I share with Sarah the saga of all that’s happened since I wrote the column—the new job, city, dog, fiancé, family, perspective, demographic category, chemical composition, life—I decide I am.

It dawns on me as I speak to this friendly stranger that I can choose to be raw—what with Shape wanting to expose me to six million expectations, my rejected novel being resuscitated, and my pending and public rites of passage. Or I could choose to be exhilarated. To let all the crazy, messy, carnival-ride chaos that comes with living rest on a couple of open veins. And smile.

I’ll think I’ll go with that. After all, it is up to me, now, isn’t it?
——————————-
Last week, I went for my first fitting and my best friend Lorrie came with me for moral support. (What if the dress, after all these months, was too small? Looked bad? Wasn’t as I remembered it? Then what?) The good news is the dress was too big. The bad news is it made me look like a participant in a picnic race.

I went into the dressing room to put it on, shouting through the curtain at Lorrie, “Don’t look.”

“I’m not looking.”

“Wait until I have it all on.” Putting on a wedding dress is a little like putting on community theater. It takes some time and, typically, an amateur is running things. “Are you ready?”

“Been waitin’ for 40 years. C’mon out.”

I waddle out, lifting the skirts up over my ankles and standing on my tippy toes to slip into my Baby Phat silver crystal wedgie sandals. (Yep, I’m wearin ‘em for the wedding.) “Well?” I’m holding back tears.

She is silent.

“It looks bad, right? Like where’s my partner and the potatoes, right?”

“It’s bad.”

“I know. Shit. Dammit.”

“Okay, but Jill, that’s why you’re here. To meet with the seamstress.”

“Is she a miracle worker?”

“Let’s hope so.”

We walk into the back room where Anna is waiting for us. She takes one look at me and shakes her head. “Okay, well, you lost weight, that I can see.”

“Yes, but look.” I am frowning. One of my glorious bridal moments, ruined by a surplus of fabric.

“Okay, okay,” she says in a thick Eastern European accent, beckoning for me to stand on a platform in front of a three-way mirror. “Don’t look ahead, don’t look up, don’t look down, don’t look to the right or to the left. Close your eyes and don’t move until I tell you to.”

“O-kay. Please don’t hurt me.” I’m thinking pin pricks. Lorrie bursts out laughing.

“What’s she gonna do to you that that dress isn’t already doing?” she asks, between guffaws.

“Okay, honey, relax,” Anna says. Her voice is soothing, like finding the perfect white tee shirt.

I stand still with my eyes closed for 10 minutes while Anna performs her magic. And when I open my eyes, I am transformed from bag lady to blushing bride, a combination of silk and taffeta clinging to my body like a newborn child.

The room is silent. I start to cry. Anna smiles. Lorrie tells me I look like a model. But I am lost in my own image. Something I never thought I’d get to see–me in a wedding dress–at least while I was hyperconscious.
——————————-

My wedding dress is halter style with a deep plunging neckline. So deep, that finding a bra that won’t show at the cleavage is becoming a problem. I started with a strapless.

“You can see this,” says Anna, pointing to the piece that connects the right side of the bra to the left.

“Can you sew in a bra?”

“No.” She says it in a way that indicates I should never ask again.

“Get tape.”

As if tape is going to hold up these middle-aged 38Ds. (Sorry to be so blunt, but hey, this blog is all about honesty.)

Yet, Lorrie concurs and, with that, I proceed to purchase a pair of bra adhesives from the Victoria Secret web site. They arrive six days later in a box that’s flat like a thin notebook. This is my bra?

I go upstairs and take two oversized bandaids out of the box, which comes with instructions. Instructions for a bra? They tell me to make sure I’m completely dry and apply from the middle of the boob outward, pressing the tape down at the upper sides (just by the armpit). I try to do this standing up when I realize that gravity is not my favor and I’m virtually blind. So I go to the bedroom and lie down on my back in an attempt to get a better shot of getting under my generous endowment.

Of course, now I really can’t see a damn thing I’m doing and the adhesive is starting to wrinkle around my flesh. The dog, now curious, has decided to start sniffing around to see what these things are all about. Her hair is flying.

“Off Winnie, OFF.” Now I’m sweating. It must’ve been quite a picture (and not one for the brochure). Suffice to say, after about 20 minutes and several positions that now require the help of a chiropractor, I decide this is a two-man job. And I know just the person help.

“Ooh, pick me,” Dan says.

“NO. Not you.”

“But honey, if you don’t put those things on properly, well, I don’t like it.”

“What do you think is going to happen? My boobs are gonna fly out the sides of my dress like wings?”

“Well YES. In front of everybody. And then you’ll take off and we’ll never see you again.”

Why are men so obsessed with boobs? Really, they’re just two inconvenient pieces of extra flesh.

So I figure Lorrie is gonna have to go above and beyond on the day and tape up my breasts. And, knowing her sense of silliness and play, she’s not leave me with any dignity in the process. I can see her now, giggling, wacking them to and fro, calling in the junior bridesmaids (my nieces) for a good laugh at my expense, before deciding it’s time to get down to business.

You’d think they’d have come up with something for us larger-chested women to wear with a plunging dress, especially for our WEDDINGS. I tell ya, if we were men and we had to cradle those you-know-what’s in something for a special occasion, there’d be more options than there are digital cameras. But for us? We get tape. That’s it. TAPE. A step above duct tape, although, I’m starting to think duct tape would work better.

So now, I’m looking for a low plunging bra. And I mean low (think bellybutton). I’m taking any and all suggestions on it. So write and fast. Never have your comments been more critical.

Until next time.
  Share

Where has the time gone? Since I last wrote, several things have happened. I’ve been on and off Weight Watchers, my hometown suffered its annual flood, and I finally hammered out the first chapter of my new novel. (It’s about time, huh?)
First things first: Weight Watchers. So let me tell you how tired I am of all this diet stuff. Weight Watchers is the best, yeah, blah, blah, blah. They have the best program, the best tools, the best meetings and support system, the best and most successful members. Whatever. Tell me: when my fiancé Dan waves an eight-ounce hamburger smothered in cheddar cheese, bacon and fried onions in my face (well, not really, usually he’s just taking a bite), where are they all then?
I think Weight Watchers should follow the Alcoholics Anonymous model and give us all sponsors. Because, gee, it’d be nice to have somebody to call at that moment, when I want to throw a fork at Dan as a distraction, grab his burger, and swallow it whole. And it should be a total stranger, somebody with no investment other than to help a fellow American who, like them, happens to love food and have crappy genes.
Now my mother’s a Weight Watcher, so I could technically call her. But only if I want to have that burger rubbed in both of my eyes, crumbs of meat shoved up my nose, and the sides of my head slapped with it whole. Figuratively, that is.
See, she’s a Weight Watcher’s Weight Watcher. The drill sergeant kind. She lost 30 pounds six years ago and now, she’s absolutely militant about it. They should friggin send her a weekend pass and a stipend.
“Did you go to Weight Watchers this morning?” she asks me yesterday.
“No, mom. I couldn’t get there. I’m just so tired.” (Never mind that I’ve got four deadlines for work, a wedding in six weeks, two stepchildren, a fiancé who works 14 hours a day, a new dog who needs to be exercised, laundry, cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, phone calls to return, fittings to attend, flowers to pick, bandleaders to meet with, and friends on several coasts to keep up with).
“Well, okay, but you’ve already lost four weeks.”
“Okay, what does that mean? Was I in a coma for those four weeks and I didn’t know it?”
“No, fresh mouth, it means that if losing weight was really important to you, you’d make time for it. I mean, you have to make time for the things in life that count.”
“Right, that’s what I’m trying to do.” Sleep. Pee. Love. Live. Stay clear of traffic.
“I’m just saying that you’re getting married, you’d think you’d want to look good.”
Okay, what’s that therapist’s phone number again? “So if I don’t go to Weight Watchers, I won’t look good?”
“I’m just saying you have to go to the meetings. That’s how I’ve managed to keep my weight off for all these years.”
Here we go. I hear Reverie.
“Weight Watchers works but you have to do it. You have to go to the meetings, otherwise, forget it. But that’s up to you. If it’s important, you’ll do it. I go and get weighed all the time. That’s because I care about myself.”
“Mazel Tov.” Shoot me now.
“Listen, it’s not my body. If you want to be big at your wedding, that’s your choice.”
Use a silencer so you don’t wake the neighbors. They’re nice people. Let them sleep.
“It’s just that I don’t know what you’re doing.”
I’m living. I’m trying to get a good night’s sleep. I have dreams every night that I look like a cross between Mama Cass and Rosemary’s Baby walking down the aisle. Doesn’t every bride to be? I’ve gone to the hair salon 14 times for a new hairdo for the wedding. They tell me they are plum out of ideas. You know it’s bad when your hair salon bans you, claiming you’ve exhausted them.
“Are you watching what you eat?”
No, I want to say. Every day I have chocolate ice cream for breakfast, cake for lunch, and a pizza and a box of cookies for dessert. Then, if I see someone walking down the street with something sugary and sweet, I’ll run up behind them, pull their hair, knee them in the lower back or the mid-groin, depending on how I’m positioned, grab their food and shove whatever they were eating down my throat. Whatever it is. Could be covered ants. Doesn’t matter.
She’s still talking. “I mean, it’s up to you, but I have to go now. Barbara is waiting for me.”
Lucky Barbara. The sad thing is my mother has no idea how healthy I am. How I walk at least two hours a day, lift weights three times a week, watch. I haven’t been to a fast food restaurant since Nixon was in office. But genes are genes. And I’m 43. And this is it. This size 10, sometimes 12, voluptuous body is just fine. The boys seem to like it. Well, I’m trying to make it fine. Why can’t she? Why do I even care what she thinks? I’m perimenopausal and premenstrual, and I need a bikini wax. Again. Isn’t that enough cruelty for one woman?
“Okay, talk to you later.” Bu-bye MOTHER. I hang up, wondering what tonight’s dream will look like. Just as Dan goes to say “I do,” the skin from my expanding body will suddenly explode like a bomb through the seams of my wedding dress. The audience will first gasp in horror and then try to stifle their laughing. Dan will wave me away like I’m a serial killer and he’s my next victim. The officiate, a gentle woman who does energy work in her spare time, will start to shake and scream, as if we all suddenly turned into ingénues from the Dawn of the Dead.
And there will be my mother, standing next to her favorite Weight Watcher lecturer, the five-pounds-away-from-anorexic Andy. They’ll be shaking their heads in disgust, as if I just told the whole room they had boogers. Rolls of fat will start pouring down the sides of my body like flesh-colored lava. I can just see it now.
Of course, it doesn’t help that my best friend is now on Weight Watchers and has lost like 3,000 pounds (that she didn’t need to lose) in five minutes, sans exercise. My mother is going to rub that in my face like the hamburger.
I want to scream. Honestly, I do. In these situations, I try hard to remember that my body is not a thing to be hated, but something that, despite its desire to cling to every morsel of fat it can find, carries me around on this earth. I can stand up every morning and lie down every night. My legs move me from one place to the other. And my functioning brain lets me problem solve so I can get through life and, yes, even sometimes enjoy it.
Yes, it’s okay. I’m okay. I will be a beautiful bride and I don’t need my mother to tell me that. I need only look in the mirror and know myself.
Right?
—————-
I am getting a good glimpse of what small town life in a looks like when the stores are full of rising river waters instead of customers. Poor New Hope.
See, the darling little resort town sandwiched between Philadelphia and New York I call home sits on the scenic and lush Delaware River. And, after the three floods in two years, there’s a new reality here. And it comes with a high price. One the quaint inns, craft shops, art galleries, antique shops, and the restaurants seem willing to pay, but for how long?
How much will they be willing and ABLE to respond when the next flood hits—to evacuate, toss hundreds even thousands of dollars of damaged inventory into overloaded trash bins. And to recover from financial AND emotional losses, and rebuild? How much longer will they work to survive the rains when few come to support them in the aftermath?
They cleaned up quickly this last time, in the hopes that people would come quickly to support them. I’m not talking about the Red Cross trucks that lined the street once the clouds stopped crying, or the humanity among townsfolk that surfaced when flood waters temporarily dampened their spirits.
I’m talking about the fair weather friends—literally and figuratively—who love New Hope when the sun is high in the sky, the temps soar, and the deals are for the offering. When the outdoor cafes offer homemade lemonades and cold beer. And when a diversity of people fill the streets, coloring the already vibrant landscape that defines them.
Now I live on a hill, so didn’t suffer any damage. But what goes up must come down and, when I do, I don’t see what I used to. It makes me sad that, when rough times ride into town like a band of motorcycles on a beautiful spring day, too many forget about us.
Where are you all? The press only reported the damage, so let me give you the rest of the story: New Hope is up and running, still gorgeous, and open for business. Come. Eat. Shop. Spend.
We’re counting on you.
Until next time!
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Where has the time gone? Since I last wrote, several things have happened. I’ve been on and off Weight Watchers, my hometown suffered its annual flood, and I finally hammered out the first chapter of my new novel. (It’s about time, huh?)

First things first: Weight Watchers. So let me tell you how tired I am of all this diet stuff. Weight Watchers is the best, yeah, blah, blah, blah. They have the best program, the best tools, the best meetings and support system, the best and most successful members. Whatever. Tell me: when my fiancé Dan waves an eight-ounce hamburger smothered in cheddar cheese, bacon and fried onions in my face (well, not really, usually he’s just taking a bite), where are they all then?

I think Weight Watchers should follow the Alcoholics Anonymous model and give us all sponsors. Because, gee, it’d be nice to have somebody to call at that moment, when I want to throw a fork at Dan as a distraction, grab his burger, and swallow it whole. And it should be a total stranger, somebody with no investment other than to help a fellow American who, like them, happens to love food and have crappy genes.

Now my mother’s a Weight Watcher, so I could technically call her. But only if I want to have that burger rubbed in both of my eyes, crumbs of meat shoved up my nose, and the sides of my head slapped with it whole. Figuratively, that is.

See, she’s a Weight Watcher’s Weight Watcher. The drill sergeant kind. She lost 30 pounds six years ago and now, she’s absolutely militant about it. They should friggin send her a weekend pass and a stipend.

“Did you go to Weight Watchers this morning?” she asks me yesterday.

“No, mom. I couldn’t get there. I’m just so tired.” (Never mind that I’ve got four deadlines for work, a wedding in six weeks, two stepchildren, a fiancé who works 14 hours a day, a new dog who needs to be exercised, laundry, cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, phone calls to return, fittings to attend, flowers to pick, bandleaders to meet with, and friends on several coasts to keep up with).

“Well, okay, but you’ve already lost four weeks.”

“Okay, what does that mean? Was I in a coma for those four weeks and I didn’t know it?”

“No, fresh mouth, it means that if losing weight was really important to you, you’d make time for it. I mean, you have to make time for the things in life that count.”

“Right, that’s what I’m trying to do.” Sleep. Pee. Love. Live. Stay clear of traffic.

“I’m just saying that you’re getting married, you’d think you’d want to look good.”

Okay, what’s that therapist’s phone number again? “So if I don’t go to Weight Watchers, I won’t look good?”

“I’m just saying you have to go to the meetings. That’s how I’ve managed to keep my weight off for all these years.”

Here we go. I hear Reverie.

“Weight Watchers works but you have to do it. You have to go to the meetings, otherwise, forget it. But that’s up to you. If it’s important, you’ll do it. I go and get weighed all the time. That’s because I care about myself.”

“Mazel Tov.” Shoot me now.

“Listen, it’s not my body. If you want to be big at your wedding, that’s your choice.”

Use a silencer so you don’t wake the neighbors. They’re nice people. Let them sleep.

“It’s just that I don’t know what you’re doing.”

I’m living. I’m trying to get a good night’s sleep. I have dreams every night that I look like a cross between Mama Cass and Rosemary’s Baby walking down the aisle. Doesn’t every bride to be? I’ve gone to the hair salon 14 times for a new hairdo for the wedding. They tell me they are plum out of ideas. You know it’s bad when your hair salon bans you, claiming you’ve exhausted them.

“Are you watching what you eat?”

No, I want to say. Every day I have chocolate ice cream for breakfast, cake for lunch, and a pizza and a box of cookies for dessert. Then, if I see someone walking down the street with something sugary and sweet, I’ll run up behind them, pull their hair, knee them in the lower back or the mid-groin, depending on how I’m positioned, grab their food and shove whatever they were eating down my throat. Whatever it is. Could be covered ants. Doesn’t matter.

She’s still talking. “I mean, it’s up to you, but I have to go now. Barbara is waiting for me.”

Lucky Barbara. The sad thing is my mother has no idea how healthy I am. How I walk at least two hours a day, lift weights three times a week, watch. I haven’t been to a fast food restaurant since Nixon was in office. But genes are genes. And I’m 43. And this is it. This size 10, sometimes 12, voluptuous body is just fine. The boys seem to like it. Well, I’m trying to make it fine. Why can’t she? Why do I even care what she thinks? I’m perimenopausal and premenstrual, and I need a bikini wax. Again. Isn’t that enough cruelty for one woman?

“Okay, talk to you later.” Bu-bye MOTHER. I hang up, wondering what tonight’s dream will look like. Just as Dan goes to say “I do,” the skin from my expanding body will suddenly explode like a bomb through the seams of my wedding dress. The audience will first gasp in horror and then try to stifle their laughing. Dan will wave me away like I’m a serial killer and he’s my next victim. The officiate, a gentle woman who does energy work in her spare time, will start to shake and scream, as if we all suddenly turned into ingénues from the Dawn of the Dead.

And there will be my mother, standing next to her favorite Weight Watcher lecturer, the five-pounds-away-from-anorexic Andy. They’ll be shaking their heads in disgust, as if I just told the whole room they had boogers. Rolls of fat will start pouring down the sides of my body like flesh-colored lava. I can just see it now.

Of course, it doesn’t help that my best friend is now on Weight Watchers and has lost like 3,000 pounds (that she didn’t need to lose) in five minutes, sans exercise. My mother is going to rub that in my face like the hamburger.

I want to scream. Honestly, I do. In these situations, I try hard to remember that my body is not a thing to be hated, but something that, despite its desire to cling to every morsel of fat it can find, carries me around on this earth. I can stand up every morning and lie down every night. My legs move me from one place to the other. And my functioning brain lets me problem solve so I can get through life and, yes, even sometimes enjoy it.

Yes, it’s okay. I’m okay. I will be a beautiful bride and I don’t need my mother to tell me that. I need only look in the mirror and know myself.

Right?
—————-

I am getting a good glimpse of what small town life in a looks like when the stores are full of rising river waters instead of customers. Poor New Hope.

See, the darling little resort town sandwiched between Philadelphia and New York I call home sits on the scenic and lush Delaware River. And, after the three floods in two years, there’s a new reality here. And it comes with a high price. One the quaint inns, craft shops, art galleries, antique shops, and the restaurants seem willing to pay, but for how long?

How much will they be willing and ABLE to respond when the next flood hits—to evacuate, toss hundreds even thousands of dollars of damaged inventory into overloaded trash bins. And to recover from financial AND emotional losses, and rebuild? How much longer will they work to survive the rains when few come to support them in the aftermath?

They cleaned up quickly this last time, in the hopes that people would come quickly to support them. I’m not talking about the Red Cross trucks that lined the street once the clouds stopped crying, or the humanity among townsfolk that surfaced when flood waters temporarily dampened their spirits.

I’m talking about the fair weather friends—literally and figuratively—who love New Hope when the sun is high in the sky, the temps soar, and the deals are for the offering. When the outdoor cafes offer homemade lemonades and cold beer. And when a diversity of people fill the streets, coloring the already vibrant landscape that defines them.

Now I live on a hill, so didn’t suffer any damage. But what goes up must come down and, when I do, I don’t see what I used to. It makes me sad that, when rough times ride into town like a band of motorcycles on a beautiful spring day, too many forget about us.

Where are you all? The press only reported the damage, so let me give you the rest of the story: New Hope is up and running, still gorgeous, and open for business. Come. Eat. Shop. Spend.

We’re counting on you.

Until next time!
  Share