Posts by Jackie Clark
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
I'm screaming internally, but I can't gather my thoughts to clarify them because I am sick of this shit. I am sick of, every day, having to point out to women how lovely they are, and having to be, it would seem, the only person in someone's life who tells them that they are OKAY the way they are. I'm sick of people loathing their bodies. Life is entirely too short - whether you die early or not - to bother with the self hate thing. And I am very, very over this whole obesity argument. Hip to waist ratios, pear or apple shape? I don't give a shit. Eat good food, do some exercise, but most of all, be joyful. Really, can it be that hard? What's difficult to understand about the equation - our forebears were slender because they worked their arses off, but they didn't live as long because they didn't have the medical wherewithal. Do we really need all these diet porn people making money out of us? Do you want to live to 95 - when the likelihood is that your mind won't be as sharp, you will be societally invisible, your children will be over you, you'll probably have lost all mobility, and your friends have all died, anyway? Isn't life about making the most of what you have, and enjoying it? Isn't life too precious to be farting on about how much other people eat, and why that's a bad thing? I know alot about the science of it and people, I'm high risk for all the crap you're talking about. And guess what? I don't care. I exercise, enough. I sometimes eat alot, sometimes I don't. My life as a fat person is not open to public examination. Look after your own problems. You might say that talking about childhood obesity is very different to what I'm talking about. And it is. But most people don't make the distinction. And they get the message that fat is bad, and nothing else. Self loathing begins.
In Italian "morbido" means "soft" rather than "pathological", so for a very long time I thought it meant "obese to the point of bouncy softness".
I knew I should have been Italian.
-
Wonderful, David. Volvo's colliding? Reminds me of a Frankie Goes to Hollywood lyric.
-
Hotels. Now there's something I used to know quite a lot about. When I was a child - from the ages of 10 through 18 - every year, for three weeks in the May holidays, my mum and dad, and two younger brothers and I would go on a trek around the South Island. And at other times, we went around the North Island. No budget holidays these. So I was very familiar with the inside of the group of THC hotels, and less familiar but still well acquainted with some other very fine places. One Christmas we even spent a month in the White Heron Villas (across the road from the hotel). The ones I remember the most are the Cherrywood Motor Lodge in Dunedin, Noah's in Chch, the Grand in Invercargill, the Rutherford in Nelson, the Hermitage, and the James Cook in Wellington. Not to mention the Sharella - also in Wellington. Loved the James Cook. When I was at Marsden, when Mum and Dad would come down, that's where we would stay. I used to enjoy the ice sculpture in the dining room beyond anything reasonable. Of course, I've stayed in other hotels in other parts of the world, but the ones that meant the most to me were the ones of my childhood.
-
Craig - that was lovely. I've not given up, but I have cut down impressively. The only downside is that the less I smoke, the less my body will let me smoke. Well done for quitting, well done to your better half for quitting. Don't kick any cats and you'll be fine.
-
I would add, of course, that there are far bigger problems that we all have to overcome everyday. Clothes, from my perspective, rate fairly low on the things that make you fret scale.
-
I'll take you clothes shopping with me one day, Sofie. A lot of women over size 18 get very depressed about the whole thing. If you are under a certain size, you get to go into any shop at all, and know that there will be things that will fit you. I, on the other hand, can go into only a few places to find clothes that fit and it is likely that they will be miles apart from each other. I spend alot of time sitting on designer chairs in Ponsonby Rd when I'm with certain friends. There is choice - it would be nice, however, if it were a lot less limited.
-
Hi Sofie - Carpenters' Daughter and Precious Vessels are faves from time to time, and I have patronised Extra Elegance (that one on Mt Albert Rd) - and there are alternatives out there. I like my body, and I would quite like it if designers liked it too. I don't despair or feel bad about myself if I can't find my size, and years ago, when I had alot of disposable income, I used to make it very plain to the salespeople that I was very sad they couldn't help me spend the thousands I had to spend each season. (I used to enjoy that, truth be told). I do think, however, that it would behove more mainstream designers to make their clothes in larger sizes. I mean if Caroline from TCD can cater to women her size and larger, I don't see why Liz and Neville can't make beautiful clothes for the significant women in NZ!
-
What a lovely, lovely post. I too, although an Aucklander born and bred, love Wellington to bits, and it has nothing to do with the restaurants or the theatres. I went to school there as a boarder, and it has always had a large part of my heart. The hills, the wind, the water, the city itself so compact. I even love coming in on the plane, swaying and bobbling around in the sky before coming to land on the runway that never seems as if it's going to be long enough.
-
It's funny you should be talking of things South American, Graham. I have always believed it's not a part of the world I would ever want to visit - being of a nonintrepid nature, as I am. But a friend of mine came back recently from a trip that included La Paz, Lima, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro and ended up in Antarctica via the Falklands. I have to say that her photos of BA and La Paz in particular made me think twice.
-
Well, I suppose I speak of NZ designers only, really, Craig. And excepting Karen Walker and a couple of the other youngie ones....