Stories of Work, Part Two; Fat
I pride myself on my callipygian physique, my Rubenesque figure. As I like to tell my friends, it takes a lot of cupcakes to maintain a shape such as my own. While I know that not everyone likes the way I look, I do expect some degree of courtesy from my clientele, an expectation that is not always met.
A client called to schedule an appointment with me, and arrived a few hours later in time for it. A fat older man with graying hair and a large, wrinkled nose, with pockmarked skin from a case of acne half a decade ago that time nearly forgot, waddled in and announced himself. The desk girl introduced me, and the client shook my hand, then turned back to the desk girl, and uttered the words that have so often been heard at a deli: "I'm looking for something a bit more trim."
I feel my eyebrows rise all the way to my hairline in surprise. I am not used to being referred to in such a manner, and I'm shocked into silence. Later, I retell the story to my friends, but I must reiterate to them that what offends me is not that I am not to his taste, but the way he expresses it, as though I was a cut of beef. "Yes, the turkey is over there," I wanted to reply to the clueless cretin, but he was a paying customer, and I bit my tongue. My friends often assume that I was irritated by the implication that I was fat, but I am not that sensitive. One young man understood, though, and with a voice loaded with sarcasm, told me, "I'd like to purchase two slices of Anastasia on wheat bread."
A client called to schedule an appointment with me, and arrived a few hours later in time for it. A fat older man with graying hair and a large, wrinkled nose, with pockmarked skin from a case of acne half a decade ago that time nearly forgot, waddled in and announced himself. The desk girl introduced me, and the client shook my hand, then turned back to the desk girl, and uttered the words that have so often been heard at a deli: "I'm looking for something a bit more trim."
I feel my eyebrows rise all the way to my hairline in surprise. I am not used to being referred to in such a manner, and I'm shocked into silence. Later, I retell the story to my friends, but I must reiterate to them that what offends me is not that I am not to his taste, but the way he expresses it, as though I was a cut of beef. "Yes, the turkey is over there," I wanted to reply to the clueless cretin, but he was a paying customer, and I bit my tongue. My friends often assume that I was irritated by the implication that I was fat, but I am not that sensitive. One young man understood, though, and with a voice loaded with sarcasm, told me, "I'd like to purchase two slices of Anastasia on wheat bread."