March 29, 2010

On Being 5’4″ and Weighing 115 lbs

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  • Her: Does it bother you that I’m taller?
  • Me: Hah. No.
  • Me: I never under­stood why a guy would feel that way.
  • Her: Good good.
  • Me: Usually it both­ers girls that I’m shorter.
  • Her: I don’t care at all.
  • Her: Do you care that I prob­a­bly weigh more than you as well?
  • Me: Hahahahh, every­one weighs more than me.
  • Me: Trust me.
  • Her: Hahah, I’m just saying!!!
  • Me: I’m super light.
  • Me: Why, does it nor­mally bother other guys if you’re heavier?
  • Her: Yeah for sure, I mean I don’t care one way or another…its their prob­lem not mine, they’re the ones miss­ing out.
  • Me: Well if I only dated girls who were lighter than me, I couldn’t date any­one older than 14.
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December 4, 2007

The Weight Issue

11

With a tone of gen­uine con­cern, as if I was being con­sumed by some dis­ease, Abdallah told me he noticed I was get­ting thin­ner. Perhaps this is true. I was recov­er­ing from an episode of IBS, and con­trol­ling my food intake. Maybe its my sets of nar­row, flared pants I’ve been wear­ing lately on Julie’s sug­ges­tion1.

Louise tells peo­ple I don’t eat a lot, which is true only when we’re out 2, and is also the only time she’s seen me eat. It makes me even more ill at ease when I’m already feel­ing unat­trac­tive, as if it was my fault and I wasn’t doing enough about it. Others will com­ment about the size of my waist, or make a pass­ing remark about how they wish they had my metabolism.

I try to take it all in stride, but it’s not easy when the sub­ject is con­stantly brought up.

According to my doc­tor, I’m aver­age weight — the aver­age being a range, with me being near the bot­tom. I know this, but it doesn’t make it eas­ier. Bronwen once told me that I have a weight issue, and after think­ing about it for a while, I real­ized that it was true. Even though it’s some­thing I can joke about, it’s still a source of self-consciousness, lead­ing back to mem­o­ries of my par­ents telling me that no one will love me if I’m this size forever.

Sometimes I won­der if I’ll ever get over it.

  1. Her the­ory is that baggy pants do noth­ing to hide thin limbs and make skinny peo­ple look even skin­nier. [↑]
  2. Usually because I don’t like to be too full when I’m out. [↑]
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April 5, 2007

Lessons From a Childhood of Abuse

11

I often explain to peo­ple that Karaoke to the Chinese is like drink­ing to the British. We don’t pour pints at our par­ties, we sing. It’s part of the cul­ture. The Chinese-Canadian dream is a Toyota in every dri­ve­way and a Karaoke machine in every house.

My dad was no excep­tion. Like all his hob­bies, he took Karaoke seri­ously. He had singing lessons from a famous teacher. Sometimes, he would record him­self and lis­ten to the tapes to ana­lyze his singing when dri­ving me to school. We would never talk on those hour-long rides, I would only hear him singing, some­times along with his recorded voice, some­times prac­tic­ing the parts that he didn’t have quite right.

When I was young, about seven, I would sing one of the English songs from his col­lec­tion. I couldn’t tell you why. Karaoke didn’t par­tic­u­larly inter­est me. Maybe it was a way for me to be a part of his life. He had noth­ing to do with me otherwise.

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January 17, 2007

Kilted Groomsmen

26

“You’re the per­fect woman.”

She real­izes this as she writes down my chest, waist, and hip size, then asks rhetor­i­cally, “What are the typ­i­cally ideal measurements?”.

Aaron and I could only look at each other, as we had no idea.

“36–26–36.”

“Wow, so you’re a really hot chick!”, says Aaron.

Hi-LAR-ious. Years of con­fi­dence I’ve gained, girl­friends con­vinc­ing me that I’m not too skinny, gone.

Reduced to a male fan­tasy, I’m my own dream girl.

“And how much do you weigh?”

“(Pause)…113″.

“After he’s had a buf­fet”, Aaron adds. My friend the come­dian. To con­sole me, he says, “It’s okay. Remember, you’ll be paired up with Jenn in the party”.

My coun­ter­part. The tini­est girl I know.

Thumbnail: Aaron's wedding band

In the last few years I’ve been to wed­dings for other friends, but Aaron’s the first out of my core group to get mar­ried (although Pat got engaged before him). To pay trib­ute to his cul­ture, he wants the wed­ding to be a bit Scottish — some­thing his Popa is espe­cially pleased about.

As a grooms­man, I’ll be wear­ing a kilt. As a Chinese guy, I’ll be feel­ing a lit­tle out-of-place.

Thumbnail: Matching the sporran and kilt colours
Thumbnail: Comparing sporrans
Thumbnail: Ghillie Brogues
Thumbnail: Ghillie Brogues

He asked me to give him a hand in shop­ping for the regalia. What a cul­ture shock. Looking through cat­a­logues of claid­heamh, sporrans, Sgian Dubhs, Ghillies Brogues. I can’t even pro­nounce the names. My tongue wasn’t made for these kinds of inflections.

“It’ll take you guys longer to get dressed than the bride”.

Before we leave I remem­ber to ask, “Can we go tra­di­tional?”, with Aaron adding, “My Popa would be pretty upset if we didn’t”.

Traditional. The euphemism for com­mando. The euphemism for bear-ass naked.

“Don’t worry, every­thing is dry-cleaned”, say the woman reassuringly.

It’s only after we leave that I real­ize every­thing but the shirt is made of wool.

I’ll be scratch­ing my balls through the whole service.

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May 17, 2004

120 Lbs.

0

Somehow, between now and the last time I went home, which was about two months ago, I gained three pounds. Three pounds is HUGE to me. Now I’m 120, a weight goal I was try­ing to hit by the time I was in my mid-30’s. Instead of eat­ing choco­late eclairs, ice cream, chips and dip, indi­vid­u­ally wrapped Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, straw­berry cheese­cake, choco­late bars, and other such munch­ables, I’m going to try to take advan­tage of post-session taste enhance­ment and eat fruits, veg­eta­bles, yoghurt, and other healthy foods. There’s just some­thing about salt though, a cer­tain taste that can’t be found in the fruits that I like. Except for bananas. Bananas rule.

I need to pick up some bananas today.

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March 25, 2004

The Weight Barrier

1

Somehow, I’m at an all-time high of 117 lb. In the last three years I’ve been fluc­tu­at­ing between 114–115, no mat­ter how much or how lit­tle I ate. I never even imag­ined that I’d break the 115 bar­rier, so sud­denly find­ing out that I was this…“heavy” came as a huge sur­prise. I’m guess­ing that it’s my metab­o­lism adjust­ing to being on a reg­u­lar sched­ule of three meals a day now, on top of the extra exer­cise that causes me to eat like a BEAST.

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