Women Who’ve Told Me How My Body Should Be
It’s 12 pm on a Sunday and I’m on the phone with my mom. I’m 22 and walking around Chicago’s Roger’s Park neighborhood. A middle aged woman wanders past me slowly and hollers, “THE BOYS WILL GET SICK OF YOUR TITTIES HANGING OUT LIKE THAT”
I’m wearing a blue tank top. It’s very hot out. The universe has given me this body and I’m not the biggest fan of it but I’m trying to keep it comfortable. I’m on the phone with my mom and a woman is yelling at me about my chest.
“HEY,” I scream at her. “FUCK OFF.”
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I’m 7 years old and my best friend’s mom is always picking me apart. I am too loud. I picked a front-wedgie in front of her. I picked my nose. I sit the wrong way, hold myself the wrong way, talk too loud and too deep, something is wrong, no matter what I’m doing with my body, I’m inappropriate.
Her daughter and I are in deep friend-love and spend every day together almost. She is icy to me. Always correcting. Encouraging her daughter to choose activities that I, with my poor posture and lack of coordination, cannot do: ballet, tap dance, martial arts. She doesn’t understand why I don’t care about my appearance. When her daughter & I crawl around the yard pretending to be demons, we are given an intervention. My every impulse is wrong.
