One of my daughters approached me recently to kind of kindly upbraid me for always "putting my self down for being fat and talking about it too much". She is right. So I gave it some serious thought and came to a conclusion. That conclusion is that I don't think I am going to be fat forever (although I wonder sometimes). And right now, the difficulties that a fat person encounters is kind of amazing in this still skinny world. There are skills a fat person develops that skinny people just don't have. And I am really curious how its going to be different when I lose that 150 pounds. Kind of like an experiment. So in the meantime, instead of lamenting my ordeal, I am going to experience and record!
The first thing I think I will talk about is FAT RADAR. Fatdar I call it. Fatdar is something that one develops when they pass from pleasingly plump to "Can I get through there?" Right now I am sitting up in the buffet area. As per usual Bill and I managed to get a table for two right by the window. A great table but as I sit here I am seeing that to get from this table to the food area I must maneuver through a number of tables and chairs with people in them. So my fatdar instantly kicks in. Can I squeeze through there? or maybe if I go that way I can squeeze through there...or...I will watch and wait until that one gets up and I should be able to squeeze through that way, but then if they come back before I do I won't be able to get back to my table. And round and round and round the fatdar goes.
Another difficulty we large people encounter quite frequently is in public bathrooms. When I tipped from large to huge I started using the handicapped loo. Its bigger, has handles and paper you can reach. One day I popped into a handicapped stall and was in there for, like, nano seconds. I am the fastest loo user on the planet. As I sat there doing whatever for the full ten seconds it took, I saw movement under the loo door. Silently, two visible wheels rolled into view in the strip of space under the door, and rattle rattle rattle. A loud aggressive voice strongly and firmly asked “Is someone in there? You better have a cane or wheelchair when you come out!”
Okay, now I am terrified. Of a person in a wheel chair. So I very quickly finish up and open the door. And there she is, all half of her. No legs, at least not that I could see. And she starts giving me shit for using the handicapped stall. So, nervously smiling and bobbing my head, I apologize…..over and over. She won’t shut up already!!!!! So finally I snapped.
“What the hell?” I yell at her. “This isn’t a handicap parking space, its a frigging bathroom stall! Its a courtesy not a law! And you think just because I don’t have a cane or wheelchair I am not challenged? WELL WATCH THIS LADY!” I stomped into the stall next to the handicapped one and I proceeded to demonstrate how a fat broad has to actually sit on the john and spread the knees unnaturally wide to the hip cracking point to get into a normal stall and swing the door shut again. Either that or stand on the damned toilet, especially in those stalls with giant toilet paper dispenser machines on the walls inhibiting knee spreadage. She sort of sat there in a mouth hanging daze as she watched me go nuts then simply rolled into her stall and finally shut up. So there. My fatdar now seeks out wheelchairs and canes before using the challenged stall!
TTYL ps I wrote a couple of others too. I may post them in upcoming non eventful days when I don't have anything to post.
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