Manolo for the Big Girl Fashion, Lifestyle, and Humor for the Plus Sized Woman.

Happy Monday, gang! How was your weekend?

I spent the whole thing on my back, and NOT in the fun way (okay, MOSTLY not in the fun way) having committed some accidental but apparently unforgivable sin against my spinal column sometime on Friday, which meant my anniversary weekend of futbol festivities with Hot Latin Boy went on as scheduled, except the role reserved for yours truly was played by the Mexican version of Lenny and Squiggy while I sat at home doping myself up on and then weaning myself off of one of the plethora of no-prescription-needed prescription painkillers offered at any one of the six million farmacias within hobbling distance from Villa Plumcake. Also I watched the first season of The United States of Tara. GOD I love Toni Collette. ALSO also I made cheesecake in my Crock Pot and it was so good I debated eating the whole thing warm and in one sitting (I didn’t, but I could have).

Anyhoodle. The other day, this plaintive e-cry found its way into my inbox and I thought I’d share it with the rest of the class in hopes that one of you will be able to lend aid and thus improve fatty/straight-sized relations for another day.

Superfantastic Reader Arabella wrote:

[Highly effective flattering paragraph about the manifold wit and charm of Miss Plumcake redacted for your convenience]

Although I’m in misses/juniors sizes, I seem to have a problem in common with a lot of ladies in the womens’ section: I have a substantial backside. No matter what my dress size is, the difference between my waist and hip measurements is a good 10-12″. While I appreciate said backside, and I think other people have occasionally done so too, it means that anything that fits around my hips has many inches too much waistband. I have a similar problem with tops, where things that fit my shoulders don’t fit my waist, and vice versa. Can you recommend any brands that play well with curvy girls that might also make things all the way down to my size? I would like to stop having to select pants based on how easy I think it would be to put three or four extra darts in the back.

And the short answer is “no”, I don’t know. I know some brands are leaning towards having different cuts, including a “curvy” cut (I believe The Gap and Levi’s both offer something in this vein) but as for a brand whose fit model is Jessica Rabbit…I got nothin’.

Readers, what do you have? I know I’ve got a whole mess of straighties out there. Shall we condemn our slender sister to a life full of stretch ponte and wrap dresses or can we help a girl out?

Put it in the comments and remember,  I always try to answer reader questions, so don’t be afraid to shoot your pal Plummy a little email (plumcake at shoeblogs dot com)

Okay gang, let’s do this thing!

I am thirty-two years old. I know I’m thirty-two years old because every few weeks my best friend and I have a conversation that goes something like this:

BFF: I want to do something really special for my thirty-second birthday, like go back to Galway or pose as a wealthy Japanese businessman and offer David Bowie an obscene amount of cash to give me a foot massage while wearing those silver spandex leggings from Labyrinth.

Me: I think we better stick to Ireland. No offense, but you’re broke and couldn’t be any more Irish if your name was Sunburn McDrinkingproblem so I don’t think the Japanese thing would work. Wait, you’re going to be thirty-two?

BFF: …yes.

Me: Then how old am I?

BFF: You’re also thirty-two.

Me: WHAT?

and so on and so on.

I paint you that little picture only as a side note to illustrate that, despite my dewy fresh skin and inability to sleep through the night without a bottle, I was not born yesterday.

Almost a third of a century has slipped through my well-manicured hands and now, for the first time ever, do I have a nickname about my weight.

Okay, let’s be honest here. It’s entirely possible, plausible even that were one to look through the Vaseline and gauze-covered lens of the past I might’ve had a fat-related nickname kept carefully from my delicate, shell-like ears. But what are you gonna do? Reagan couldn’t fix EVERYTHING in the 80’s and haters, as the internet so wisely tells me, gonna hate.

But now it’s out in the open. Last night Hot Latin Boy and I were chatting about his mother and how much I like her. My personal maternal experience, while a blessing in the potential bestselling roman a clef arena (because it’s not libel if it says “a novel” on the front!), is a little light in the tiny little ball of cherubic goodness arena so I have taken to his viejita in a big way and want to do everything I can to make her happy, as long as it doesn’t involve my cervix or Roman Catholicism.

And she likes me. She can’t say my name –no one here can– but she likes me.

“Whenever I talk to her” reported Hot Latin Boy “she always asks about you. ‘How’s your gordita?’ she’ll say.”

Gordita.

It means “little fat girl” and, strangely enough to American ears where fat = insult, it’s usually an affectionate term for attractive girls with a few extra scoops in their milkshake.

Strangely, it doesn’t bother me.

I thought it would, and the first time I heard it, I felt odd. I felt like it ought to bother me, having been raised in a society where nicknames based on physical characteristics are not generally nice things, especially for women.

And yet I sort of like being gordita. It’s affectionate, non-judgmental, worlds better than “You have such a pretty face” and then a Meaningful Sigh –don’t pretend you don’t know what Meaningful Sigh I’m talking about– as their eyes survey the rest of my body in disappointment.

It’s taking some readjustment, this whole living in a culture where fatness is not a cardinal sin and it’s made me think about how we are so afraid of admitting our bodies exist in space that we just don’t talk about them unless we’re complaining about how they “should” be.

I’m interested in hearing your take on it, especially if you come from a culture where comments or nicknames on weight are acceptable and not shame-based. Put it in the comments.