What happens when you call your fat friend beautiful.
I am sorry that I didn’t thank you right away, my dear friend, and that I seemed so distant. You were kind to pay me such a wonderful compliment, and I was unprepared.
There’s alchemy in compliments. They can change a whole day. Being called smart, witty, accomplished, fun, lively, thoughtful, strong, a good friend, a caring partner, a helpful colleague — compliments reflect parts of ourselves that we cultivate. They feel like someone is recognizing work we’ve put in, characteristics we’ve forgotten about ourselves, or aspects of our personalities that we thought others couldn’t see.
And then there’s being called beautiful. Beautiful is different.
As fat person, I’m rarely told I’m beautiful. When I am, it nearly always comes with a qualifier. “You’ve got such a pretty face. If you lost forty pounds, you’d be a knockout!” “That jacket looks great on you. It hides your midsection so well.” None of them are compliments — they’re wishes for the future. They’re congratulations for hiding unappealing parts of my body, or for some perceived disfunction. They are conditional love, promised but undelivered. You wear it so well.
Those qualified compliments say a lot about the person delivering them. They reveal thoughts that my friends and family never would about fat people. They tell…
