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Fat at Work: Pitfalls to being fat on the job
It’s not easy being stuck in the dark.
But that’s where I was, caught between stacks of metal bookshelves in the storage section of the public library.
The books were ones which didn’t circulate much anymore but that the library kept copies of for the random patron request. They were my favorites, these once-popular Evelyn Waughs and Jodi Piccoults and so on. There were some great finds in less than great shape after being handled so much, hopefully with care and consideration wearing them down by readers who loved the art of the tangible book.
It was one of my tasks to collect these requests from the shelves in the basement, the smell of musty books and newsprint permeating the air. While I’ve alluded to this in a previous piece, it bears revisiting.
So there I was, doing my job while fat, and I turned to reached for a book. Then I found I couldn’t untwist. The stacks of books, you understand,were tight together, with barely enough space to pass a cart through, and my hips touched the sides of each stack when facing forward. So when I turned there was nowhere else for my body to go.
I tried to calm myself, remembering another time when I’d done a job where I was unloading produce and had to squeeze between wire racks in a cooler. And, yes, had also gotten stuck. It took slow breathing and conscious relaxing to get out of that predicament and it was what I drew upon at this moment.
After a few minutes I was free, albeit shaken up, but it reminded me of all the buses I’d gotten on where I bumped up against the seats on both sides of the aisle. Before everyone set their bags in the seats next to them because nobody wanted me sitting next to them, afraid I might be spilling over and somewhat sitting on them or that my fatness might be catching.
I kept the getting stuck incident to myself that day, ashamed that such a situation could even happen to me, yet it was the surroundings happening to me which later made me angry. Would it be so terrible to have a little more space? What about the many people who are claustrophobic? There are other ways to look at things, other solutions.
I loved that job, even with the trouble. And it was the love for it that kept me there so long. When I would feel the heat rise in my cheeks about getting stuck, I reminded myself of all the times I’d been fat at a job and been able to navigate — had to navigate — another way of doing things. Isn’t it time for changes?
