I've always been rather fond of my rear. It's small enough so as not to be mistaken for shelf space, yet perky enough that it doesn't simply look like I have an extremely long back. Rumor is that as a baby I had "saddlebag buns", however, I am determined to believe that if I had worn jeans as a newborn I would have had a nice little tush. Throw in some heels and I would have been the knockout of the nursery.
I have had two memorable booty moments in my life...both which occurred during my college years and both on opposite ends of the how-I-feel-about-my-body-today spectrum. They may seem insignificant to you, but to me they were monumental. I spent my sophomore year of college in Argentina where I consumed meat, cheese, ice cream (it's on every corner! I couldn't help myself), and cerveza (let's hope mom doesn't know what that means) on a nearly daily basis. Life was good...I was young, having fun with friends, and learning a new language and culture. One thing I quickly learned about the Argentine culture is that women value looks veeeery highly, and as far as different aspects of beauty go, weight and body image were at the top of the list. Therefore, every single female (aside from us "normal" sized students and tourists) was stick thin. This then lead to clothing stores carrying only size zero and below. Well, not really...but if I were to purchase denim in Argentina I probably would have had to ask someone to sew two pairs of jeans together in order for them to fit. So I just didn't buy any jeans. I remember thinking one day as I sat down Man, my crack is totally showing in these jeans! Did the laundromat shrink them? It seriously took me a few days to realize that no, the laundromat did not shrink my jeans (although they did leave bleach marks on many of my shirts, grrr), but rather, my butt was growing. One can only live on a cheese and beer diet without any exercise for so long without seeing a change in their muffins...or in this case crackage. When I finally realized what the deal was I felt like I had just had the epiphany of a lifetime. I was devastated to see that I wasn't as resilient to weight gain as I had previously believed. And that was the moment that I really started being conscious of my weight and the size of my clothes...and it will probably never end. Arrg!
The next butt moment occurred soon after my return from Argentina. After nine months of bulging out of my jeans I was ready for a change...and since I had an entire summer in Malibu with free gyms and running trails at my fingertips, I took advantage. Luckily for me, my roommate was in favor of a hardcore summer of workouts and dieting as well, so from the moment I got back we motivated each other to keep up the good work...and although the motivation was often more of a competition which consisted of making sure I worked out longer than she did, or her telling me she ate a cookie so that I wouldn't feel guilty eating one and then later laughing that I fell for such an obvious trick...it worked. That summer we both lost a ton of weight and our clothes started not fitting. This lead to a trip to 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica where we promptly tried on everything in American Eagle and Gap. It was here that my butt moment happened. As I tried on pair after pair of jeans, excited that I could fit into such a small size (small for me at least...no sewing of additional denim necessary), I soon became disappointed. I no longer had a butt! At all! I was just flat and curveless. Although muffins weren't exactly the curves I wanted, at least I had had soooomething to make me look feminine before!! Arrrrrg, I just can't win.
Today I'm reasonably happy with how much I weigh and how my jeans fit. Since James has left I have lost a decent amount of weight, as has he. We clearly have bad eating and exercise habits when we're together...something we definitely need to work on. I find that as I prepare for our wedding day I am again trying to find the balance between my crack hanging out of my jeans and having no curves at all...I want to exercise as much as I can before the wedding so I can look my best on that day and not have to worry about my double chin or jiggling arms...but I'm working on just being happy with being the curvy girl that I am...and I must say, I look pretty darn good in my wedding dress...and a curveless girl certainly couldn't pull it off. So...like Dove commercials say...or possibly Oprah...I'm going to embrace my curves. Not to mention that James claims to be a butt man ;)
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