Being Skinny in a Land of Giants

The stigma of being skinny follows the Thin Crowd like a ghastly shadow. Living in the land of behemoths, my 165 pounds clearly qualify me for minority status. Yet I’m not alone. Arise, O army of scarecrows…and unionize.

**********

I was born skinny. I was so thin at birth they mistook me for a skeleton. They wrapped me in a shroud. My mother lost weight during pregnancy. Nurses asked if I were nine months premature. I’ve remained virtually invisible ever since.

Americans are enormous specimens these days. Look around…they have forearms the size of tires, legs like logs and trunks like Corinthian columns. The earth shakes when America walks. Steroids work wonders. People pay attention.

Nobody notices skinny folks. We evaporate in crowds. Without noses and feet, we’d have no profile whatsoever. Our spindly arms dangle from the sleeves of Polo’s like strings of spaghetti. Our clothes detest us. Our suits look like they want to crawl off of our bodies. Our legs are vestigial reminders of another era.

The emaciated among us endure hard lives and much derision. Many are the perils of being skeletal. Scales mock us. We stare at them in horror while they register each precious ounce of ever-declining body mass. We’re fearful in their presence. Last week in the food store I popped a quarter in one. It laughed and gave me back change. Scales have no respect of persons!

Skinny people have colossal appetites. Our metabolism is a raging blast furnace. We eat relentlessly. We burn through our bank accounts supporting our habit. We consume vast quantities of carbs. Calories ooze from our pores. Our hunger is rapacious. It’s a ravenous beast that claws our bellies like shards of broken glass. It’s insatiable. Without us, the potato futures market would collapse.

We survive on snacks. We’re on a first-name basis at Dairy Queen. We have reserved seating in yogurt shops. We are singly responsible for the profits of all Dunkin’ Donuts. We are addicted to peach milkshakes at Chic-fil-A. Ben and Jerry’s consult us. We’re enslaved by ice cream.

Our compulsive cravings hold us hostage. We’re shunned from party guest lists, especially those that feature buffets. Our passion for protein has made us social pariahs. The last invitation I received contained a PS: “Eat at home or brown-bag it.” They obviously remembered the last time…the time when I slid out the side door with their fruit bowl. After devouring three apples I discovered the fruit was plastic. I’m still recovering.

We swarm the natural health food stores, stocking up on whey supplements and elixirs that promise to flesh out our shrunken frames. Look at our faces. Are we smiling? Do we look healthy? Hardly! We’re walking cadavers. Black hearses wait for us outside these stores like buzzards preparing for meals.

We Bone-bags love to jog. No one knows why. Normal people don’t have these compulsions. Have you ever seen a happy runner? NO! We are not happy people. We’re tormented. We run to escape our wretched condition. Ambulances follow us in the distance, certain of the inevitable.

We don’t do diets. We read Italian recipe books and cook. No food is off limits, unless it’s green. No lettuce, no veggies. Lots of red meat, bread and beer. Sugar is the staple, butter is the backup, cheese is the crown. Add eggs, white flour, a lot of Crisco. Now you’re talking. It’s a primordial curse.

Life is boring beyond belief. It’s like living in a desert, a desolate existence in a world where nothing ever changes…same waist size, same weight, same everything. Think about always hearing, “My, you look the same, are you ill?” Hopeless.

The worst thing about being skinny is esthetic…wrinkles. The skin on our faces and bodies sags, then collapses. There’s no escape. Avon comes calling daily with its lotion van. We grease up like Yankees sizzling in the Miami sun. Nothing works. So grotesque are we that even Wal Mart refuses us entry.

**********

Many are the lamentations and afflictions of skinny people. The Fates have dealt us a very strange hand indeed! What can be said?

We are the voices of many, crying in this wilderness of plenty, “More waffles, more waffles!” And we wouldn’t have it any other way!

Bud Hearn
September 27, 2013