Beauty (in terms of grooming and physical appearance) is a display of wealth and health. The standards are set according to what, at the time, is the most difficult and expensive look to attain. In the old days, being plump was for the rich people. They could afford to eat those calories but not burn them off in a day's hard labor. These days, it's flipped around. Being plump is easy. Being thin isn't. And, of course, the ideal is about impossible for an ordinary person to reach. But we pay a lot of money and time trying...
You know what's really interesting? It's kind of rude to ask someone about their weight, especially a woman. But I've dropped a noticeable number of pounds in the last year (can't give you a number as I've banned scales from my life
) and people remark on it by saying "You look good!"
Thing is, I didn't look bad before the weight loss either. Or, at least, I didn't think I looked bad.
And it's not like I was really wanting or trying to lose the weight either. It just happened. Massive life changes, even the ones I want and anticipate and plan and prepare for, do that to me and I got hit with some doozies in the last year or so. All positive, but not exactly minor. And it occurred to me this past week that the shrinking act is slowly continuing as gauged by how my clothes fit. I've also been feeling cold and hungry all the time, another sign my weight's changed. Now some of this may be because I spent ten days climbing mountains in Ecuador, but really, the signs were there before the trip as well. Anyway, I'm going to watch it. I think part of what's going on is the life changes of '09 were accompanied by some changes in my eating habits. Weird things happen when you change jobs, I guess, but I can live with it.