Picture of the day's blog: I was lying on the couch while tech does stuff remotely on my computer and I waited to get it back. I stretched out my legs, in shorts for the first time in a very long time, on a day in March when we are reaching unheard of temperatures in the °70s. I try not to think about how brutal the coming summer will be since there's nothing to do but bask in the early springtime warmth and hope for the best later.
But this post isn't about the weather as much as it is about what this first sign of warm weather does to me and, I suspect, a whole lot of other women. I snapped the picture, half to capture the warm sun across my legs, half for the way the daffodils glow. But that's not what I thought about looking at it.
Here's a hint: I was so obsessed with picking over the horribleness of this picture, I completely missed that my finger is in front of the lens.
The whole host of things I was mentally making notes on, while entirely missing that giant finger shadow, include the following thoughts:
1. The whiteness of my legs is one degree short of glow-in-the-dark. Yuck.
2. The shortness/thickness of my legs means I could walk five million miles and never come close to the "pretty" legs every mannequin/model/actress in America has. Bless my heart, I'm stocky and I know it.
3. The lack of pedicure/paint means my feet are ugly (er) than women's feet are supposed to be. I'm a complete slob.
Which really pisses me off.
I am so conditioned to find the flaws that I have to mentally force myself to switch gears. Those rhino-chunky white legs carry me on long walks without complaint, and are showing a lot more definition these days thanks to it. It's not their fault they haven't seen the sun in months, and it's probably for the best. Just because I'm fed tan=healthy every day of the year doesn't mean I have to buy into it. Or, more realistically, I can keep trying to buy my way out of it. And, dangit, when I get around to giving myself a pedicure, it'll be because I want to, not because I can't leave the house with "ugly" feet. People can look somewhere else if they're so sensitive.
Step one: leave the house without changing into pants and sneakers. (Yes, I actually thought about it.)
Step two: share insecurities in order to both banish them from my thinking, and because I have a teenage daughter who doesn't need to hear her mom hating on herself, ever.
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