January 13, 2002

• Bathing suit designers should be shot.
  

  I had the day off yesterday. By that I mean, the hub looked after Mouse from the time he got up (okay, he slept in) until she finished dinner. It was unplanned – I wanted to go to the library alone, so I could choose some books, but it was closed and I ended up having to go to the one in the shopping mall. On the way there, LoveGod said – ‘have fun, hang out and see you when you get home’. Being the opportunist that I am, I immediately made secret plans to see a movie, and shop shop shop without the sticky hands of a toddler groping me as I struggled in and out of yet another too small fitting.

  
  

  Bliss, I thought. I wandered through the upscale department store, spritzig perfume on my neck and longingly looking at clothes that would have fit me 3 years ago (I’m counting the pregnancy, okay). Now I need the fat lady clothes. I am 5’10.5” and about a size 16 – up 2 sizes from where I was pre-Mouse. My boobs could have their own postcode – I have been known to go to a size 18 for properly fitting shirts. And no, it’s not sexy; it’s mama-boob, that amorphous mono-boob that signals the end of tight t-shirts and the beginning of tailored and not so tailored ‘tops’.

  
  

  I don’t know what possessed me to go into the bathing suit department. Perhaps its’ the fact that it is the height of summer here in Sydney, and I haven’t yet been in the sea. And my kid loves the sea.

  
  

  So, I flicked thru the racks of lovely skimpy things. Bikinis that would barely cover my elbow and one piece that are cut so high that if you sit down too quickly you’ll be sliced in two. In white, in lavender, in lime green, in orange. All I wanted was something sturdy in a dark colour, that would hide my vestigial baby belly, life my boobs up to where they were before I breastfed and didn’t make my ass look like something upon which you would plant a flag and claim it as ‘new territory’. Oh and it has to come up high enough under the arms that the floppy bits are more or less camouflaged. I can tell you what it should look like – it should look sorta of like a 1950’s bathing suit – but no little frilly skirts please:

  
  

   Well, that is apparently impossible. I guess bathing suit manufacturers think all us fatties should stay home or better yet, go to the beach wearing a voluminous t-shirt and a pair of men’s board shorts. The only people who should go to the beach or be seen wearing a bathing suit are pre-pubescent girls. OR models. Too bad about the rest of us – you know, the older women who actually can afford to pay $190 for a bathing suit, cos we don’t count.

  
  

  I have big boobs, a great high bum, long firm legs that don’t have an ounce of fat on them, and at almost 40, there is not a whisper of cellulite. But that isn’t good enough for the demons who make swimsuits.

  
  

  I must be humiliated, I must be publicly shamed, I must be a figure of fun or wear something that begs people to say ‘kick me’.

  
  

  I don’t want to wear something that is going to make people run screaming into the sea begging for a shark attack, honest I don’t.

  
  

  I don’t want to wear a floral frilly skirt thing either – I am not 80.

  
  

  I am well aware of my figure limitations. But they are easy to camouflage, I should know, I’ve been doing it with varying degrees of success for the past 2 years.

  
  

  Maybe all the designers are men who hate women or gay men who would rather be dressing men in drag. I can think of no other reason why the rudimentary facts of a woman’s figure, known to every man on the planet since age 12 are so completely and utterly ignored by people professing to dress those figures.

  
  

  Hint: Boobs are bigger than waists. And asses are bigger than waists. And in most women, their asses are bigger than their boobs. If you are a big boobed woman, chances are you are proportionately bigger all over, except if you are Pamela Anderson who is 90% silicone anyway. If you are a larger size, there is probably a good chance you are taller than the average woman too, so it would be nice to have proportionate body lengths. Ask any teenage boy if you aren’t sure what we look like under our clothes, cos they’ve had lots of practice imagining. Mind you, these facts are only true of women who have in fact, passed through puberty. Which is why they call us ‘women’ not ‘girls’.

  
  

  So someone somewhere, start designing swimsuit cossies that cater to real women as well as the waifs and the teenagers.  Cos after all, we have the money. Have I mentioned, that we have the MONEY?

  • 6:28 pm
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