I No Longer Skinny Dip–I Chunky Dunk (And Zombies too)

The other day, my 72-year-old father told me he wants to get his chest and back waxed.
“What? Are you crazy? Do you know how much that will hurt? You look fabulous just the way you are!” I replied.
“My hell, Marci, I should be living in a tree eating bamboo!” he said.
My Mom took the phone from him and said, “Marci, you should have seen what he looked like when I married him. He was a golden adonis with no hair ANYWHERE on his body!”
Oh boy, I was hoping by the age of 72 I would have gotten off of this crazy carousel of vanity swirling around me. At 41, I’m already relieved that I can just be myself with no pretense for trying to look, act, or be sexy. I look around me and see women on the endless and relentless treadmill of botox, plastic surgery, workouts and diets, and I think there’s got to be more important things to spend time and energy on!
And yet, I can’t help but be sucked in. I’ve been on one diet after another since my body was pretty much destroyed with my pregnancies. On one hand, I embrace my imperfections. My body shows the after-effects of bringing two beautiful beings into the world. I’m proud of my body, amazed by my body, and yet, I’d like to be toned and thin and be able to eat whatever I want with no exercise. I’d like my breasts to shrink back to a D, my body to shrink back to a size 4.But alas, it’s wishful thinking for now. I’m a mother of two young children–I have to be peppy and cheerful. There’s no room in my life for the grumpiness that comes along with dieting. I can’t prioritize exercise since I want to be with my children. No, the world will just have to live with my mushy mama body, my DD breasts, my muffin top and jiggles.
We went out to dinner at a restaurant where the servers are all opera singers whose voices make me weep in the middle of my Penne Arrabiata. I walked into the ladies room there and found an intriguing painting–it looked like an old cameo of a beautiful victorian woman, but she was a skeleton and it said “Tis all vanity.” Indeed.
Why do I struggle so with vanity? I am about to turn 41, and I am so thrilled to be able to release vanity. It’s a relief to be comfortable exactly as I am, to not feel like I want to be sexy, dress sexy, act sexy. And yet, I looked at my legs this morning while stretching in my living room and thought “Who’s legs are those? Surely not mine?! Mine are lean and tanned and toned!” This is where my reverse anorexia comes into play. I feel good. I stand behind my yoga teacher when I make it to class and I think I look like her. I’m always shocked when I catch a glance of myself in a mirrored building. What? Who is that chunky matronly woman? And there I go again! Feeling the ever-tugging pull of vanity. I wave at someone and I feel the undersides of my arms move! What the hell is happening to me!! I made my living off my body for years. It has served me well. But what is going on now? Do I have a few more years left in me for bikinis? Or is it time to hang up my strings and go for the tummy control tankini? Or do I just join the hordes of women who just don’t care, who let their muffin tops hang over their suits and say “To hell with it!” There has to be a happy medium.
I suppose it all boils down to feeling good in your body–feeling strong and flexible and capable…For example the last time I went water skiing I popped up on one ski on my first try. I felt so strong and fabulous! And now, I’m more flexible then I’ve been in years, able to do headstands and sit in the splits for long periods of time. And it feels REALLY good!! So I guess I just keep going, feeling good even thought I could stand to flatten my belly and tighten up everything. But maybe that’s gravity and age.
I no longer skinny dip–I chunky dunk.
And maybe, just maybe, one day all the jiggles will melt of their own accord and presto! I’ll be the new improved me!In the meantime, my parents and I have been talking a lot about zombies lately. I did a paper on the theme of zombies in Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys at UCLA and my Mom recently read a book about zombies so we’ve had lot’s of fascinating conversations. My Dad wrote to me the other day after his high school reunion: “If you’re in doubt about zombies being real, you have only to look at my high school reunion group photo! Yikes!”
Well, if the quest for vanity never ceases, at least I can keep my sense of humor.