Source
Not too long ago, Sophia told me that I look like a walking Renaissance painting. And I’d never considered it in a serious way before, aside from the fact that I’d noticed the only place I ever seem to see my body type besides in the mirror is in art from that period.
I mentioned it to my boyfriend and he completely agreed. They had an obsession with “chubby, small breasted, angelic faced women” in his words and that’s a pretty good description of my physical self. I’ve got the round, smooth face that’s almost flat from a profile view, but still has a pointed chin. I’ve got the small but perky chest and this strange looking little tummy that makes a line right across my belly button. Even when I was half the size I am now, I had that little pouch of fat below that line and it would never go away no matter how much I attacked it with exercise. My mother says all of the women in her family, even the skinniest, are cursed (I’m trying to use the word blessed now) with that abdomen, though, they all got huge racks that seem to have skipped me.
It seems so silly, but, I’ll be honest, since then I’ve spent no small amount of time reading about and looking at Renaissance art. Titian’s Venus, as seen in the photo, might as well BE me for all the resemblance; I’m just a little heaver than she is right now. I’ve spent so many years loathing what’s under my clothes, and trying to cope with that fact, and trying to accept it all, and deal with it, and really I just want to get over it and move on because no one should waste so much emotional energy caring that she’s not “pretty enough”, and fussing over having her photo taken, and getting upset when she tries on clothes and they don’t fit. And somehow this realization that I may not fit today’s beauty standards but I am practically the modern embodiment of those of an era long past has made all that easier. I like the end, though I’m not sure I’m proud of the means: I shouldn’t need to fit anyone’s beauty standards to have self confidence. And I know that. But for now, I’m just going to keep my head high, telling myself I’m a walking piece of art that most people don’t know how to appreciate, and carry on until I believe it all the way.That’s the way I would look at it, for sure. :)
That is, without a doubt, the way I’ve looked at it for quite some time now. In the Renaissance, wealthy women were overweight because they could afford food. Round women were the utmost and I remind myself of that every damn day :)
