I like my coffee the color of my skin – caramel, like a latte. Now that last sentence has nothing to do with the rest of this entry. Sue me.
I wonder if people understand that it’s not nice to call skinny people skinny. Growing up I heard the word skinny used to describe me all the freaking time. And I hated it every.single.time. In a time where “I like big butts” was the national black anthem; it wasn’t cool to be skinny. For years I NEVER wore skirts/dresses. I barely wore shorts and only did so because it would get so hot in the summer. And let’s even talk about Keds. Yall remember Keds, don’t act like you don’t. They made your feet look like they were boats. Boat feet + skinny legs = not cool.
I can’t recall the exact age I was, but I became determined to thicken myself up. Every morning before school, I would drink a chocolate shake, and throughout the day I would eat all of the junk food I could get my hands on. My mom packed my lunch every day. But in my eyes it was too healthy, so instead I “upgraded” to the not so healthy cafeteria food, praying that the scale would go above 110 lbs. Yet, no matter how hard I tried, I just could not gain weight. I had a slight break through when I started working at the local chicken joint and actually got up to 115. I was ecstatic!!!
Somewhere in between the 10th and 11th grade, I just stopped caring and realized I had the body I had and the only thing I could do was accept it. And it honestly became one of the most freeing experiences of my life. Over the years, I learned that when people made snide remarks such as, “Oh you’re so skinny. I just want to feed you”, they were actually projecting their own insecurities on me. And as much as I wanted to say back “Maybe you should actually do the opposite of eating”, I usually just smiled and said “Be careful, don’t let my size fool you. I will eat you out of a house and home. I just have a high metabolism”.
I don’t think I will ever have a scale in my house. I have a general idea of how much I weigh, but I refuse to be hung up on numbers. I love my body and have been taking steps to take better care of it because it’s the only one that I have. And oh yeah, I am also a slight exhibitionist.
