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Random thoughts, inconsistent posting |
 My meandering thoughts |
I read a NL today that got me thinking (again) about perspective. How we feel about ourselves as a person and a writer. Here's a little background about me. I was always over weight. Growing up I was the FAT girl. I wore dresses (in the 50'-60's) to school and they were homemade tent dresses that Momma Cass made famous. All it did was accentuate my figure. To my mom I was a disappointment. Her mother constantly berated her about me telling her it was her fault I was fat and to do something about me. She tried, but I idolized by dad, what he ate I ate. He worked, I read. I was fat, and after I married, it got worse. I won't go into the issue there, but my self-esteem dropped and I read as an escape, voraciously. At forty I was over 300 pounds. I was working and saw a girl who had her stomach stapled. I watched her lose weight. My husband watched her and encouraged me to do the same. I did. What a change it made in my life. I never reached my goal of 145-155. I got down to about 185 or less and then I stabilized. I received compliments and attention from the men I worked with. This strengthened my self confidence. It had been non existent for all those years and I slowly gained it. I wasn't FAT anymore. No matter what that scale said, I wasn't that FAT person anymore. Stress and job situations caused me to nibble, I constantly ate crackers, pretzels, cookies at work and slowly gained weight. It never got too high but I struggled at over 200. HOWEVER, I had changed. I was not FAT. Yes the scales showed a number I wasn't happy with, but I wasn't FAT. I dressed in nice clothes that people complimented me on. I worked at a clothing store so I chose great outfits that others copied, I wasn't FAT. I joined this writing site and worked at becoming a writer. This also gave me confidence, I published a book, now 2 and I'm dieting again. I may get down to that 145-155 at some time and all it will do is keep me healthy. Hopefully not having that weight on my knees and legs will keep me from having knee replacement that my sisters and daughter have had. Still that will not change who I am. I am a published author. I write good stories and help others to accomplish their goals. This last year I helped a woman I met on another site who lives a few miles from me. Eventually she asked me to rewrite her novel and she'd pay me. I finished it last month. Another woman has asked me to rewrite her autobiography and I'm working on that. There is still that little Fat girl in a corner. She will never go completely away. That niggling that I'm not good enough, still haunts me, but it gets knocked back into the corner when I get a "Good Job" from something I wrote. When I give a critique and they say thanks for the suggestions, it helps. Every time someone reviews a piece and likes what I wrote. That fat girl stays down. I think its looking at your own perspective. Losing the weight won't change you all by itself. You have to accept that change. It was a struggle for me and I made big mistakes. I thought I was hot stuff for a while, I had all this attention I'd never had and didn't know the first thing about how to respond to it. I shudder now at my actions and thankfully there were people around me who loved me and guided me through it. I accepted the new body, the respect it afforded me. I looked people in the eye and didn't make fun of my body before they did. I compliment people on their choices. I support writers here because I know the struggle of learning to write good stories. My perspective had changed from the FAT girl who can't do anything right, to the semi-confident woman who is a published author and helps others to achieve their dreams, no matter what that dream is. |
I found this prompt on another site:Set-up: Father loses high level job, mother cannot work due to physical challenges, and teenage daughter, an only child,is a senior about to submit college applications and did not apply for aid - would not have qualified given her parents income. The parents have done a poor job of saving as they lived paycheck to paycheck. They are breaking their news to their daughter this evening… Briefly, make us feel the dialogue… Here's what I wrote: Gina stared at her dinner plate in silence. Her parents weren’t talking as they normally did. Her mother would be telling them about her crafts she’d sold on line. Her dad usually regaled them with work antidotes. Tonight there was silence. She looked at her mother for the umpteenth time. Had she been this pale and I didn’t notice? The food in her mouth tasted like sawdust and she took a drink from her glass to wash it down. Did her mother see the doctor today? She didn’t remember an appointment on the calendar. The sound of her father dropping his fork on his plate broke the silence like a Chinese Gong. “Gina, we have something to tell you.” Gina froze, then let her hand lower the fork to the plate. No sound. She stared at her father’s sad expression then at her mother who played with her food as she’d done all dinner. “What is it? Did you get bad news from Mom’s doctor?” She reached out her hand to lay it on her mother’s arm. There was no response. “No, it isn’t that.” “Then it’s all good. Nothing is worse than that.” She smiled at them both forcing her voice to a high pitched false tone of joy. “I’m sorry, Gina, it’s almost worse than that.” He gave a long pause and stared toward the kitchen door as if he couldn’t look at them. “I lost my job. They laid me off due to budget cuts. I got a severance package, but that won’t last long if I don’t find another job quick. With your mother’s bills,” he paused again, this time his eyes met Gina’s. She saw tears well up behind his thick lens. “I’m afraid, we can’t help you with college.” The words came out like air from a balloon. Gina didn’t speak as the ramifications processed in her brain. No college. She’s just talked to her counselor and had a list of colleges to apply to. She wouldn’t qualify for them. She’d have to go to the local community college and work at part time jobs just to pay for those. “I’m sorry honey.” Her mother put her hand on top of the hand on her arm. Gina jerked it away. Heat flowed from the top of her head to the soles of her feet. “No you’re not sorry.” The sound exploded between clenched teeth. “You’re not sorry when you took the vacation to Yellowstone. Or the week to the Bahamas and all our other vacations. I know I went too, I had no choice. I had fun, but now I’m paying for it!” She stood, her chair wobbled on two legs and fell with a crash. "It was your choice. You did it for fun. Then it was over and I have a mouse hat with a big bow, pictures of me swimming with dolphins, and standing in a tunnel with a shark swimming over me. " Her voice trembled and she swallowed. “What will that look like on a job resume?” She leaned her fists on the table. Tears rolled down her cheeks, "I know how to have fun, but I didn’t prepare for the future. I thought you had been putting money away for my college fund. When I asked about it, " She looked at her dad’s bent head, “You! you told me Not to worry, you’d take care of it.” She stood straight. “I guess you did.” Holding her head up she strode to the stairs and when she was out of sight ran up them and threw herself on her bed. |
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She is a great woman and so kind to me.