…And no condition attached to it. No “if ony you’d lose weight”. Wow.
A little earlier this evening, I had decided to take a walk in the park. I always like doing that after dinner, when the temperature has fallen a little and I don’t run the risk of getting a sunstroke just by staying outside for more than ten minutes. I was waiting at a corner of a street for a line of cars to finish passing me by, when a young man on a bike came the other way and, upon arriving near me, said: “You’re so very pretty”.
The sad part is that my first thought was to wonder if he was mocking me. Athough I didn’t suffer much from insults and derogatory names when I was younger, sometimes I’d still get them, and even in the past years, I can remember quite some occurrences of men trying to hit on me in the street by calling me pretty, then, when I’d say I wasn’t interested, throw me their “You should be grateful I’m offering you to have sex, you’re so fat and ugly that nobody else will ever want you” witty retort. (I kid you not. Unfortunately.)
At least I was dressed nicely enough. A long, light-purple sleeveless dress that shows juste enough of my curves to enhance them and not make me look fatter, nicely decorated high-heeled shoes, and a little handbag. No old jeans and baskets.
And then, came the other thought. That of him being actually sincere. That of him actually finding me pretty. Sure, I am not perfect and will never correspond to the current beauty standards (at least not if they remain close to what the media show us on TV and in magazines), but am I really ugly? Sure, I’m short and still fat, but does this warrant constant mockery? I used to weigh more than that, wear awful clothes, not take care of myself; was this what I was like tonight? And finally–that damn sounded like a compliment, so does it hurt to take it like one?
The amazing part, however, is that I didn’t need more than one second to process all those thoughts.
I then told him “Thanks”. He smiled back, and was gone after that.
And indeed, I felt pretty.
