Part III: What Happens a Cappella? (Chapter 61)
The prelude would be simple, a blueprint
for preparing my people for my great keynote address ‒ no flutes, no brass horns, no drum rolls. Then I’d just say,
without fanfare, what I have to say. Still, my entrance must be carefully
measured: my tempo perfect and timbre impeccable.
And if I accept the grant to
France, maybe ‒
I’m
famous, a great painter of dark psychological works, maybe a Jungian-type
artist; my work appears at MOMA and the National Gallery.
My fans love me, old best friends and boyfriends call – some even
stalk me – everyone wants a piece of me.
Whenever I come back home, my people flock around me, in awe. I have
been placed at the head table, the seat of honor. Nothing is ever said about my
weight ‒ it’s not even an issue anymore.
Brave, I show my most recent painting for everyone to “ooh” and “aah”
over, a mural-sized oil painting of a fat lady ‒ me ‒
but they don’t know that because most of my people know nothing about art, and
those who do learned about it in the Midwest, at small, provincial schools.
The painting’s an angular, geometric piece, almost Picasso-like,
monochromatic with Prussian Blue as the base color. I’ve always loved Prussian
Blue; I seem to run out of the color all the time. I like its bold darkness,
its aqua qualities when I add a speck of it to white.
I unveil the painting for everyone to see, and, of course, they don’t
understand its significance, but I do: every variation of Prussian Blue has
meaning in my life ‒ the painting is a visual script of my childhood,
my dieting, my life.
When Gwen asks me, the famous family member, to give a keynote
address, I have the script before me. I get up from my place of honor ‒
my monochromatic Prussian Blue gown blending in with the visual script ‒
and take my place at the podium.
Silence prevails as eager familial faces prepare to hang on every
word that will come out of my mouth.
I take a good, long look at the audience…
Then I speak ‒
I crumple the paper into a ball and slide
it in my pocket.
I’m not impressed with Aunt
Gwen’s “Fantasy Keynote Address” idea. I guess Gwen just wants to expand on
Sal’s family biography project, her idea of the creative muse hitting the
Mallory family after millions of years of linear thinking. The thing is, I’m
sure that Gwen expects me to long for a thin body and great beauty. How do I
explain that my fantasy runs much, much deeper than that? That I just want understanding
for who I am right now? That “diet” is a dirty word? That I’d rather get up in
front of my people and yell “fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck...” a million times
before I could ever explain to them the effects of the word “diet” in my life?
As I go through the buffet line, I take
little dabs of tavern meat, green bean casserole, potato salad, baked beans.
I’m always a bit uncomfortable
about eating at family gatherings. I feel as though my relatives are
scrutinizing every bite that I put into my mouth and calculating my current
weight.
If I eat anything “illegal,”
Aunt Sal will invariably announce to the throng,
“Skinny’s in the ice cream!”
I have learned to take small
portions. I fill up by making several trips through the line, and for dessert,
I choose items that will slip easily into my pocket, like cookies and Bing
Candy bars.
Right now, I feel a Double Bing
bulging in my left pocket.
For later, when no one’s
around.
After all these years, why am I
still sneaking food?
Sheldon is sitting at the
picnic table, looking at snapshots.
“Aren’t you eating?” I ask as I
set my plate down next to him.
Without taking his eyes off the
pictures, he says, “I’m not hungry yet.” He passes a snapshot to me. “Is this
you?”
My third-grade school picture.
A smiling eight-year-old, but I didn’t feel very happy that day. I was dreading
the apple and lettuce packed in my brown bag ‒ and
yearning for Cheetos instead.
“Yeah, it’s me.” I sigh and
hand the picture back.
“Cute little kid.”
“Fat little kid.”
Shel studies the photo.
“Hmmm...I don’t see it. You look pretty average to me.”
“I was on a diet.”
Sheldon shakes his head.
“That’s extreme.”
I snatch the photograph back
and study it again.
He’s right; the curly-haired
child does not look particularly fat ‒ maybe a little round in the face, but no
more than many kids that age.
About those Cheetos Nana never
put in my lunch: I’m having a sudden snack attack for fake-flavored cheese
curls.
In a low voice, I ask Sheldon, “Could you see if there’s any of those cheese curls around?”
“YOU MEAN CHEETOS?” Sheldon
booms.
“Not so loud.” I can feel my
face turning red. “Someone might hear.”
“So?”
“I just don’t want the whole
world to know about it.”
“I don’t know what the big deal
is...”
From the next table: “Who wants
Cheetos?”
“Over here!” Sheldon says.
“One bag of Cheetos, coming
up!” My cousin Jim tosses the bag to Sheldon who catches it with one hand.
“Skinny’s in the Cheetos!” Aunt
Sal yells from across the room.
I can feel all eyes on me, and
I give Shel one of my “looks.”
“Okay, okay,” Shel says. “I see
what you mean.” He opens the bag and passes it to me.
“I don’t think so,” I say,
watching Sal who is no longer paying attention to me.
“Samantha,” Shel says, shaking
his head, “I just can’t figure you out sometimes.”
“You and me both.”
But I know what it’s all about.
I just want respect from my people, a respect that transcends my body size.
It’ll never happen, unless I do
something about it.
And maybe not even then.