NapOWrimo : Day 8- Thighs

I love my thighs.
I didn’t always.

They would rub together under my Holy Cross wool skirt in the spring and summer and cause such a rash and burn like fire.

I couldn’t wait to get home and throw on sweatpants and pretend it wasn’t happening.

I hadn’t yet discovered talcum powder.

it works wonders.
totally blocks sweat and thigh burn.

and I was a chubby kid

i needed loads.

but my thighs would say hello even before my meek self could.
my art teacher in elementary school Mrs. Husby

Used to call me “Pernil” which is a Puerto Rican traditional dish served usually during Christmas. It’s pork.
basically they called me a pig.
Boricuas

“No tienen pelo en la lengua”

”don’t have hair on their tongue”

but they also said it with mad love maybe?
gordita was a regular word in my life too.
they would laugh and snicker and thought it was cute. I laughed along sometimes as I would lug myself and bookbag down the hall

thighs jiggling the faster I stepped away.

Bouncing as I ran down stairs.

when i tried running.

I just shrugged it off and hid under my jansport and big bear coat and probably stuffed little debbies in my mouth on the way to the bathroom.

my thighs rubbing against my stockings

rubbing against eachother

rubbing against my self esteem.

We always needed new pairs of stockings to wear under my skirts because my thighs would rub them into erasure

and in the summer months I got to wear knee highs but those never looked as cute as I hoped.

I tried to be sexy once as a teen but that never worked either.

once I hit 14 I thought maybe I could play it off like Britney Spears in the “Baby One more Time” video but no.
my thighs would protrude outside of my knee highs. They had a gut of it's own. Almost melting down and making my knee highs roll to my calves almost.

once we got uniform pants

Finding school pants that would pass up my thighs was a blessing.
well one thigh fit but not both,sometimes.

I loved men's clothes

so I would take my father’s tee shirts but his jeans never made it past my knees.

shopping for my thighs were a bitch too.

I would cry in department store fitting rooms

at really embarrassing plus sized stores my mom would take me to. With clothes that weren’t in style- but tried to be.

One day a retail worker came in the changing room and talked to me for an hour and calmed my tears. She was so kind. She encouraged me to love myself. I don’t remember her name but I remember her til this day. She was beautiful,big and empowered.

In other places Men would weep to have my thighs on their lap.

people loved my thighs in Harlem

Or Washington heights

would honk at my thighs

stare at them like they were the Eiffel tower.

Men would call out

“mami todo eso es tuyo!?”

”all of that is yours?”

to which I would reply.
“umm yeah.” Perplexed to the question.

Did they think I did plastic surgery?
really it meant- a ton of things.

like dam that’s a lot!
but also- dam that’s real?
it held many interpretations I suppose.

I never entertained them long enough to know.

I didn’t quite understand what they meant.
maybe women would purchase my curves somewhere I wasn’t sure of.

I learned later that was true.

but your body had to be proportioned perfectly to be a dime.

big thighs,small waist.

big butt. Small tummy.
And my body had a mind of it’s own.

it turns out in 2021

my thighs aren’t a total loss

I’m glad I invested in all of those snacks back then

My thighs came in handy when playing wrestling with my cousins though.

I could squeeze their necks and hold the grip for longer than 15 seconds.
break their necks if I needed too. But no I never did.
it’s always my go to when I think of self defense situations.

I wouldn’t punch anyone but drop them to the ground and use my thighs for cuffs.

it’s also handle bars to my lovers when they would go down on me.

I could even walk for miles and feel the muscles peek in but never form.

I could bike for hours

I could swim for longer than my friends

I had “thunder thighs” and you could see them walking down the block before me.
boom

boom

boom

above my size 11 Air Force ones

I was just

taking space

there she is

the Amazonian woman.

I hated shorts unless I had to slip into a pool to hide them. In 1995 when I wanted to wear shorts my first time in Beverly Hills

and the photos came back looking not even close to the models on the billboards above rodeo drive I never wore them again until maybe 2017.

or sitting on the stoop

with a book on

My lap and a friends arm

a resting post for my friend’s coloring books and markers

a table for Chinese food on the bus ride home

And in the year I lived in Dominican Republic

while catching taxis to the center of the Winston Churchill or

“La Churchi” where 7 people would squeeze into a 5 passenger car

i had to pay double for taking up two seats

One fare for each thigh.

yup. Double. Instead of 20

for me it was 40 pesos and an annoyed size 4 Dominicana who would have to take the next car and be late for work.

in nyc my thighs could hide under big sweats

but

In humid Dominican Republic

where you can’t help but wear less

it meant

“come sola” like you “eat alone” and don’t share your food.

I read somewhere that our bodies sometimes are built to protect us.
Perhaps my thighs protect access to the most innate part of me

my womb.
I didn’t quite understand why a woman my size came from a woman like my mother

but when I see my grandmother

I get it.

I don’t think she would have been able to cradle 6 boys with weak limbs.

our bodies

our thighs were made to carry our family

quite literally.
we walk into a room and our thighs say hello first.

it’s part of my wholeness

and I’m a redwood in the most majestic forest.