Susan Senator

I don’t know what this is. It is probably the beginning of a novel. Maybe it’s stupid. Maybe it’s funny. Or both. Or annoying. Either way, it’s straight out of my head. See what you think. I wrote it several years ago…

The world of women is comparable to a bowl of fruit. There are the round dark plums, the hard, boyish apples, the melons, the exotics, and of course, the peaches. I was born to be plump, round, voluptuous, zaftig. Call it what you will. Not thin. Also, my hair goes with the body type: curly-to-frizzy, deep brown, always shoulder-length.
I was also born to be the nurturer in my family, the patient , supportive one, the understudy, the second born.
I was born a plum. Sweet, dark, round. Or maybe a sack of overripe plums.
This is more or less what I was thinking as I checked the mirror as I always do when I first got up that morning and tried to find an outfit that would disguise my bumpy stomach, camouflage my too- muscular thighs, and play down my too-voluptuous breasts (in conjunction with a minimizer bra). There was very little to call attention to, except for my eyes, I guess. That morning was no different from any of my others, except that morning I happened to read an article in the “Stargazers” column of the newspaper. Actually, every morning I do read Stargazers but this morning I saw an item about Jennifer Aniston. Jennifer is a slim blond peach — but I know better. On the inside Jennifer is a plum just like me. She’s actually dark-haired and curly but she has the staff to blow it out perfectly. Her highlights have been so artfully applied, so that over the years you forgot her first appearance on the show “Friends” where she was as brunette as Julia Roberts. But even Julia is no longer brunette.
I twirled a bottom curl, the kind that grew near my neck, around my finger and thought defensively, Why does everyone go blond? What’s with all the two-toned stripey hair? Then I pulled the curl and looked at it, its pubic thickness so dense and lacking in shine. Yeah, well. Okay. Blond is better. Unless you’re Catherine Zeta. Straight is better, too, while you’re at it, unless you’re Giselle.
But even more than the hair, I think Jennifer was once a fat girl. A true plum who became a peach. I don’t know for sure; I just feel it.
So naturally it caught my eye when I read the following in the paper:
Aniston, 33, is a follower of low-car b eating, Atkins in particular. “It’s the only thing that works. It’s the only way to get those extra pounds off, easily. Except every now and then I could kill for a bowl of pasta.” Aniston is one of many Hollywood stars now following the low-carbohydrate craze, a diet fad that inverts the food pyramid, placing meats and proteins at the bottom and grains and starches at the top, allowing the dieter fats to their heart’s content – or discontent. “The jury is still out as to what the longterm affects of such a diet are on one’s cholestrol and blood sugar levels,” said Dr. Lars Kunevsky of the University of Pennsylvania Medical School. “Certainly a diet low in carbohydrates will, in the beginning phases, cause rapid weight loss. But what happens to a body deprived of such an important energy source over long periods of time? I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Ordinarily my eyes glaze over at the description of a diet’s philosophy . I don’t diet. The most I’ve ever done is Slim Fast, where you drink a “delicious shake” for breakfast and lunch, then have a “sensible dinner ” at the end of the day and the pounds just melt away. Well, I found the shake terrible and had one with my not-sensible lunch because the shake did not fill me up at all and it made me panic that I would not be able to hold out until my sensible dinner! Hence, the huge dinner.
But Jennifer followed this diet. And Jennifer lost weight “easily.” And Jennifer was a former fat girl.
So my mind churned up these creamy details, shaping them into a fine buttery idea, leading me to get out a bagel and toast it. And then as the hard slab of butter went limp around the edges as it melted into the brown and black surface of my bagel (which was so perfect and plump its hole was a mere crease in the middle. Desirable in a bagel, kiss of death in a woman.) I thought about this diet and me. I tore at the soft underside of my bagel and squeezed it like a sponge between my fingers. Some butter dripped from its little folds and I licked it. They said you could have fat. How could that be? What about that Dr. Kunevsky, what about what he said about longterm health?
What about what Jennifer said, about losing weight easily?