My Formerly Hot Life (9 page)

So what’s a woman who has lived through the ’80s to do, when all of a sudden she is told that the ’80s are “back!” and she has a feeling she’s not supposed to partake in the plaid mini-kilt and Doc Martens trend this time around? I still want to look relevant, attractive and in-the-mix, of course, and not as if I shop at Chico’s. (Sorry, but COME ON with the giraffe prints and chunky faux African beads! That’s where I would go if I wanted to look like a college profesor
emeritus’ poet wife.) Then again, I don’t want to go around wearing ironic machine-distressed T-shirts featuring cereal box icons from my childhood. My body’s not the same as it was, the way I spend my days is not the same, what I want to project has changed and my tolerance for discomfort has certainly changed, too.

That last one is huge. Formerlies are juggling so much (I won’t blah-blah-blah you with the litany of roles women our age are playing and how many balls we need to keep in the air—you’re living it). Suffice to say that when you feel as if you’re perpetually ten minutes late for your entire life; are carrying a briefcase, a gym bag, groceries and maybe a diorama of an eyeball your child made for science; are hungry; need to pee and feel guilty that you haven’t had sex with your partner in a month, the last thing you need is for your bra strap to be digging into your shoulder.

And yet, it’s still important to you to look good and to feel attractive, even if, like me, you’re partnered and so are not actively seeking to attract anyone you haven’t already. This push-pull between comfort and style accounts for a large part of my closet paralysis. I think of it as the Comfort vs. Style Smackdown, and which will win depends on the day. See if you follow:

I can remember in my early 20s weaving my way home from a bar in the snow wearing open-toe heels, a mini-skirt and a motorcycle jacket. I’d known it was going to snow—in fact, it may have been snowing when I left the house—but I had a creed that was no less principled than the
postman’s: Neither rain nor snow, nor sleet, nor dark of night shall stay this vain, silly girl from wearing something inappropriate for the weather if she thinks she looks good in it.

These days, when I rush by just such a gaggle of 24-year-olds outside a bar in the snow with only their hotness to keep them warm, I’m wearing one of those heinous goose-down vertical sleeping-bag coats, a hat chosen for it’s ability to cover my ears (even though it destroys my hair) and shlumpy Uggs that make my feet look like elephants’ feet. I look like shit, but you know what? I’m warm. Warm trumps sexy any day.

What I’ve lost in objective hotness I’ve gained in common sense and the ability to reason—across the board and in all things, but especially when it comes to my fashion choices. Ronni and I popped into a Steve Madden end-of-summer sale last year, and among the fabulously comfortable
and
hot (Joan Jett studs, anyone?) flat sandals I eventually bought, stood these high-concept, architectural marvels. They were some four inches high, with fringes and patent-leather patches and cutouts in the upper (think open-toe-and-heel boots, like a monokini for your feet). I surely would have tried them on 15 years ago, but not this time. Ronni found them laughable, and if you think of them as shoes, she was correct. But if you think of them as little statuettes for your feet—like wearing an Emmy or an Oscar—they were kind of awesome. I would be proud to have one on my mantel, if my apartment had a mantel. And at one time I would have been proud (albeit sorry by Happy Hour) to have had them on my feet.

When I went to pay for my flats, I was telling Ronni how I can’t wear heels anymore. Sometimes, I can do wedges, but even they are tough for a whole day. The saleswoman (maybe 25) looked surprised. “I don’t know if shoes have gotten more uncomfortable or if my pain tolerance has gone down, but I’m done done done with heels,” I said.

“It has to happen sometime,” she responded politely.

“Yes, well, it happened sooner than I thought. Ha-ha.” There was an uncomfortable (for me) silence. I waited for her to agree that I was too young to be fated for flats forever. But she didn’t. She just smiled blankly, in that way people who believe they will always be young and hot (and able to wear heels all day) will do when looking their future in the (finely lined) face. I didn’t bother to correct her.

Thing is, I now realize that when you’re a Formerly, you need your feet to function. If you have someplace to be, generally speaking, people are relying on you to arrive (perhaps your children or your business partner). It’s not, like,
whatever
, if you show up. Tottering or limping in 20 minutes late because OMG your shoes are just killing you and you couldn’t find a cab but OMG they are SO CUTE AND TOTALLY WORTH IT isn’t an option. Flat shoes: a small fashion sacrifice to make in exchange for being able to walk.

Still, it is entirely possible to take the whole comfort-is-queen thing too far, and I live in fear of that. A 20-something wearing lounge pants from the Gap and a tank top may look a bit sloppy, but still potentially adorable and sexy. A Formerly, not so much. Witness what can easily take place when comfort is the only consideration in the selection
of attire. (I have to warn you: This may be difficult to read, but no one who loves you will have the heart to tell you if you are turning into this woman, so it’s a good thing I’m here. She lives within all of us.)

It all starts reasonably enough, with a pair of Merrell fleece-lined clogs, quite possibly both the most comfortable and ugliest shoes ever made. You buy them because you need something to run out to the end of the driveway for the paper in (or in my case, down to the laundry room in your building). It’s not a big leap from there to shuttle your kid to a playdate in them, and oh, maybe stop at the FedEx Kinko’s on your way home. The next day, you slip them on, get the paper, deal with breakfast and then realize you’re late for an appointment and figure you can get away with not changing out of the sweats you threw on this morning … just to get your hair highlighted and maybe run to the supermarket. The following day, you decide it’s OK to not wear a bra, as long as you keep your hoodie zipped. Oh, look. It has a stain. Big whoop. It’s not like you’re going to the Oscars … And on from there.

Before you know it, you are one of THOSE women. You know, the ones that before you were a Formerly you used to look at and wonder how she became one of THOSE women. Eventually, you realize that you only go places—Starbucks, the mommy group, the mommy group that meets at Starbucks—where you can dress like one of THOSE women. That’s when you know you’re in trouble. When your clothing dictates your activities, and not the other way around, you have crossed over to the dark side.

I must have blocked it out, but when my girls were small, I was one of THOSE women on the weekends and every minute I wasn’t at the office (I worked at a magazine that was housed in the same glittering tower as
Vogue, GQ
and
Glamour;
I pulled it together to go into the office because there is an invisible electric fence that zaps THOSE women as they try to enter the building). I know I was one of THOSE women because before I put them in the InSinkErator there were pictures of me looking like a bean-bag chair. Briefly becoming one of THOSE women postpartum or postdivorce or postapocalypse is understandable, of course. The key, as I now understand it, is to remember to come back.

I
f your metabolism had a middle finger, it would be wagging in your face right now. That’s how I picture mine: like an embittered, withholding ex, claiming the Indigo Girls CDs you’ve had since college belonged to him and pettily refusing to acknowledge that you once shared something that was, if not perfect, mutually beneficial for a time. If I didn’t know that my metabolism wasn’t actually a sentient being (and I do know this, despite the fact that I’ve been overheard cursing it out), I’d say it was out for revenge, as if I’d publicly questioned its virility or left it for a younger, faster metabolism. I did not. I’m the one who was dumped.

I don’t see any other way to interpret its attitude. My body has been a gracious hostess, encasing it for lo these several decades. If I am to blame for anything, it’s lavishing upon it a few too many empty calories to work with. Is that really so wrong? The Big Metabolic Fuck You (TBMFU, for short) is how it repays me. Nice. Real nice. Attaway to be a team player.

Of course, I am aware of how fortunate I am that TBMFU is, right now, my biggest health issue. It seems just a wee bit Tori Spelling (who was “only” left $800K in her rich daddy’s will) to complain about this when there are those whose bodies are failing to cooperate in much more profound and life-threatening ways. But in the absence of a bigger health crisis to worry about, TBMFU—that seemingly sudden refusal of your body to process what you eat without padding your pooch—can be profoundly unsettling to your average female Formerly, who is, thankfully, still relatively healthy.

I never had a problem with my metabolism before now. The problem was with my head. I was a thin kid, but nonetheless believed I was fat and had an eating disorder in my teens. I have spent the years since unlearning how to be a freak about food and just eat normally, whatever that means in a country where it seems as if everyone’s either paying for two seats on the airplane or has hip bones jutting out like wall brackets you could set a bookshelf on. My metabolism bore with me as I figured it out, and my weight had been stable and healthy for many years. Probably because I’ve always exercised (with varying degrees of compulsion); if I lost myself in a can of chocolate-covered almonds and then ate my way back out, it was nothing that paying a little extra attention for the next few days couldn’t even out.

Then I became a Formerly, out came the middle finger and all of a sudden I couldn’t zip my pants.

The reason I’m so fixated on TBMFU (aside from the fact that weight gain and sluggishness are welcome at nobody’s pool party) is that it is the clearest example of the phenomenon that repeats itself over and over again, when it comes to the physical aspects of life as a Formerly: I now have to work even harder to remain
in the exact same place
. Ever since turning 40, when it comes to my weight, my level of fitness, how effectively I manage my stress, as well as all the little stretches and supplements I cannot skip if I am to maintain my well-being, if I didn’t redouble my efforts, I’d lose ground fast. Before long, I’d wind up a large, flabby, anxious and exhausted nervous system covered with sallow, acned skin, instead of the vital, radiant, attractive if no longer hot specimen you see before you (or would if you could see me). It’s like I’ve stepped on one of those moving sidewalks at the airport, except that it’s begun to move backward. It was slow at first, but I’m noticing that now I have to walk briskly, trot and sometimes jog outright simply to not wind up back at the security area. Never mind making my flight.

Some examples, as if you don’t have your own: A month-long stint of lifting weights at the gym previously yielded visible triceps. Now, if I can coax them out, they must somehow distinguish themselves from the adjacent layer of flesh that apparently has no muscle in it at all, meaning it’s un-tone-upable. And when I was in my 20s, I could at least
pretend
that if I had the motivation to do all the crunches that the magazines I wrote for advised, I would have flat abs.
Now, after having twins and actually doing those damn crunches (and Pilates and planks and all the other core tighteners), I know I never will. Nothing short of a doctor slicing a big Cheshire cat grin from hip bone to hip bone and lashing my separated stomach muscles together will give me those elusive flat abs. (That’s actually how they do it!) And that’s not going to happen.

My friend Maryn wasn’t a big fan of her metabolism even before TBMFU. When hers slammed on the breaks, “I felt like, oh, great, this is like having a bad relationship with your mother, and then having an argument with her.” Maryn earns her living writing about bizarre epidemics like MRSA and swine flu that everyone worries disproportionately about while millions of people do their grocery shopping at the 7-Eleven. Maryn was never thin, but neither was she heavy, and now it’s even harder to be, well, not heavy. She likes wine. She likes a good meal. These are not crimes. As a health writer, Maryn knows exactly what she should be eating and how much. “But emotionally I’m in complete revolt against that,” she says. “I feel like one of my few routes to uncomplicated pleasure has been taken away by my body’s misbehavior.”

Maryn swears there was an audible click when her metabolism went into energy saver mode, but for my Formerly Metabolically Blessed friend Karen, the slowdown was more gradual. She was a little slip of a Madonna-loving, barhopping, late-sleeping girl when we hung out in our early 20s. “I ate anything and I never thought about it twice. I
was on the smoking-waitressing-drinking-till-4:00
AM
diet,” she says. At the time, she was working and putting herself through school. Now she’s got the degree and is married to a lovely guy who likes to cook her romantic 9:00
PM
dinners after they both get home from work, and then settle in for an evening of cuddling and watching movies. Her job as a production coordinator for commercials is less physically taxing than was hoisting huge trays over the heads of wild Wall Streeters, and she’s also had two kids. How much of any of our Formerly-era weight gain is due to TBMFU and how much is due to the combo of eating more, moving less and losing metabolism-boosting muscle mass is probably pointless to tease out.

Nowadays, Karen probably couldn’t wait tables as she did back in the day, not that she’d want to. She’s not in fighting shape anymore, but even if she were, she’d have to pay a hefty Formerly Tax for her exertions, because her body’s recovery time has slowed down as much as her metabolism. When I’m feeling sunny and at one with the universe, I decide that the fact that I’m disinclined to do the things I did in my 20s—work late, go out and get silly drunk and then arrive home late and have cereal for dinner before sleeping five hours and doing it again—is my body’s way, in its infinite wisdom, of protecting itself. Other times, I think it’s because I’m a big old slug. Oh, you can still have a good time. But as a Formerly, it’ll cost you. To wit, here’s how much you’ll pay for any fun you have: