[JennyHallu]

I assign shopping trips that end up in crying dressing-room confessionals, not to mention drawn-out battles between yourself and your body.

I assign racks of beautiful clothes that don't fit, the gap between the second two buttons in every blouse in the store, and the lines the best you can find leave on your skin.

I assign the thickness of my ankles and the roundness of my face. I assign the salads that don't help and the pastas that my husband loves. I assign my bad left knee and my bad right ankle. I assign the out-of-breath wheezing at the top of a small hill. I assign my image in the mirror and my bathroom scale.

What is it about women that no matter how we look to others, we can so rarely look in the mirror and see someone beautiful? My husband tells me I'm gorgeous and desirable, but I look at myself and don't believe him. My daddy blamed the pill, and mentioned that my mother looked just like that when she was pregnant. I'm not pregnant.


I assign the fact that my mother and father return to Indiana today. I love it down here, I think most of you know that. But sometimes...sometimes I just want to go home and be near my family. Today I want to go home.