Ode to Function

"The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing of blood and air through my lungs . . .

The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun."
-"Song of Myself", Walt Whitman

I have a really good pelvis.

Good, in the case of I'm-getting-ready-to-give-birth-to-a-9lb-4oz-infant, by the way, can be summed up in one word: LARGE. I am not just vain or optimistic. I was told this a week before my son decided to finally make his entrance, and my husband can verify the elation that ensued. I literally sang songs about my great pelvis, shouted them to the world in the parking lot as we left the office. For some strange reason this embarrassed my husband. I figured, since we were leaving an ob's office, all the pregnant women entering and exiting would fully understand.

Oh how things change.

If you knew me in college, or the few years that followed, you know that my 90-pound frame drew comments ranging from "I would DIE for that metabolism" to "Does she have an eating disorder?" (For the record, I ate like a hog back then, as I continue to do now. For some reason, the old body doesn't handle millions of calories like it used to.) Back then being thin and looking decent mattered to me. The body was all about decoration. It was a tool to help the other parts of me (my brain, my personality, etc) get me what I wanted, and I don't just mean a fine-looking husband.

Then, I entered career-land, and looking like I was a pre-pubescent twelve year old became somewhat of a liability when I became a teacher of twelve year olds. The pounds began to creep on. But it wasn't until Justin and I started talking "let's try for a kid" that I really became, well. . . not ninety pounds anymore.

Here's the ugly truth. We women care about our weight. Even the most intelligent, wise among us can't curb the desire to be thin. Some of us, of course, care a lot more than others. But I became a whole lot more comfortable in my skin, despite, or because of, my ballooning weight, once I became pregnant with my first. Suddenly, my body was more than a nice little vehicle to get me around life. It was more than a fashion accessory. It became a human-creating-sustaining machine. This is remarkable. This is a miracle.

Take breasts, for instance. Those two once useless lumps morph into these incredible baby-feeding-machines. Just last week as we were leaving the state fair, my husband caught two less-than-reputable-middle-aged-men staring at my cleavage (enhanced, of course, by milk at the moment) as I put Lucy in her car seat. As they passed by, giving me a smile and a wave, Justin remarked dryly, pointing at my sweaty son, snoring softly in the stroller: "Stop looking. Those things are HIS."

And so, though I'd be lying to say I love the way my thighs rub together and the slight double chin that can result from an unfortunate photo-angle, I've got to say .. . seriously, who really cares about a few pounds?! A few early-twenty-somethings and I were talking the other day, and they discussed, with real animation, the fear they have about getting pregnant some day. "I'm just going to blow up," one said,"I will have to work out every day before and after I give birth." (They, by the way, forgot to mention how incredibly great I look after just giving birth eight weeks ago . .. hmmm . . . ) "But look what you get out of it!" I replied, pointing at a fussy Zander. They smiled politely and continued on, exchanging diet advice, as if I had missed the point entirely.

I didn't miss the point. And to every mother, fat and skinny and somewhere in-between, don't forget to sing a song of yourself everytime you begin to consider all of the things you'd like to change about something as trivial as your face, your legs, your jiggly arms. There's one little ditty that you actually want running constantly through your head . . .