25/02/2009

SEE that picture over there?


The one with the skinny girl in a jumpsuit? That could be me.

Honest. They do something similar in my size, even much bigger.

Up to, and including, a size 32. But who the hell would want to wear something so sausage like and unforgiving when you’re “plus” sized anyway?

Those with a lack of taste and vision I guess, and who don’t mind getting undressed to go for a wee.

I am, as you know, a cheerleader for the big and bountiful and optionally beautiful brigade, except when it comes to bestowing my own virtues as that’s a far more complicated proposition.

But I think, by and large (absolutely no pun intended), that women, regardless of what their clothes labels say, can look and feel amazing.

Just not in a jumpsuit.

Think confident in her own skin Beth Ditto – but only when she’s not bending over in a pair of tight jeans and a cropped top or singing a high C in a G-string and nothing else.

You get an idea of the kind of unfettered, lovely, fulsome and bountiful sense of self I’m talking about, something which I wish I could feel from the top of my big hair to the tips of my sensible Clarks boots.

I like to surround myself with positive role models, and it helps if they’ve got love handles you haven’t got to look for.

Those I turn to for guidance or tips on how to get bacon fat off my kitchen tiles and who may be on the skinny side usually offer me different kinds of insight, but they all have one thing in common – their don’t-give-a-b***** wisdom.

They’d tell me to stand proud and think equally capacious thoughts about myself, and ditch the ridiculously tight wringer I put myself through day in and day out as I struggle to come to terms with what I’ve allowed myself to become and how tight my trousers really are these days.

But they’d never, ever, tell me to strut my considerable stuff in anything which would be prefixed with the adjective “unforgiving”.

On Saturday, desperate for some clothes as my three pairs of black trousers are literally washed out and so short I’m think of putting jam on my ankles and inviting them down for tea, I went shopping.

That’s shopping, as in something that’s supposed to make you feel better. It’s not called retail therapy for nothing you know.

First stop, and usually my only stop unless Box2 have a sale on, was Evans.

And do you know the first thing I saw? A jumpsuit. Size 28. So plenty of room to hide both my belly, my sandwiches and good taste from the world.

Perhaps it’s really called a catsuit or the similarly titled playsuit, but regardless of its name I’m only thankful it didn’t come in PVC and an accompanying whip. It should, however, have come with a warning: “Not to be worn if you’re over a size 10, aged under 25 and your name isn’t Pixie Geldof.”

The trouble with fashion for big birds is that the stuff which suits is invariably too expensive; the things which are affordable are usually aimed at girls who don’t want to be big and whose heads are thin.

Therefore they refuse, with the determination of a dieter on a carb free plan who has been offered a pasty, to dress big.

And so zaftig jumpsuits are born.

I may be fat in the head and fat of belly, but I’m also fat on logic when it comes to dressing this stretched-beyond-reason frame of mine.

I want pretty things, I want to be able to feel feminine, I desperately want Monsoon to cater for me and every other woman out there who knows the feeling of chaffing and bra burn.

What I don’t want is to look like a fashion victim and my clothes wear me, rather that the other way around in the round.

We big girls might well go kicking and screaming into this world’s thin ideal of perfection, but even as non conformists we’d sure as hell like to look nice for the occasion.

2 comments:

Hazel said...

Thankyou, thankyou, thankyou. I love your writing and I nodded my way through "Fix my Fat Head" last night. I think you are funny and very beautiful but I know how hard having a 'food issue' can be. I have struggled with mine for years.Anyway, I just wanted you to know you have a BIG fan up here in Scotland. x

Hannah Jones said...

Wow.... thanks so much, Hazel. I really appreciate you taking the time to write. Hannah.