This is the second in the series Five Bras That Fit: Five Fittings That Touched My Soul This Year. This one is called “Ridiculous.”
A woman introduced herself by letting me know that she very much hated bras, she really hated bra shopping, and that she was a 36B. When I offered to help/measure/bring her some things, she responded, “Can’t you just show me where the 36Bs are?” and followed it up with the obvious, “I know what I wear.”
For once in my life, I shut up and just showed her the 36B section and walked away. I saw her grab a few bras, march into a dressing room, and shut the door.
After a couple of minutes, I grabbed a few 34Cs and Ds and a 32D and DD and knocked on the door asking if I could take a peek to see how she’s doing. She let me in and let me know that “These are all horrible,” as she motioned to the stack of bras she had whipped through. “I guess this one is fine.” She held up the one she had just taken off.
“I brought in a couple more for you to try.” I said, hanging the non-36Bs on a peg with tags facing the wall with one hand and pretty much just guiding her arms into the strap holes of the 32DD in the other.”
I barely got the thing hooked on her and she whipped to the mirror. “Hey, wait a minute,” she said more brightly than I’d heard her say anything. She put her hands on her hips and did a few “face to the mirror/turn to the sides.” There might have even been a smile.
But then there it was: the realization that she wasn’t in one of her 36Bs. She stopped admiring herself. “Wait. A. Minute!” She started flailing kind of like when your allergic to bees and one is near you or when you walk into a cobweb, “Wait!…what is this?” she frantically asked grabbing for the tag and turning towards me. What IS this?!” She was pulling and reaching for the tag…
(Uh oh.)
“What???? …. A 32???? A double D???? …. No. No! Get this off. Get this off. It’s terrible. I can’t do that. … I can’t.”
And with that she whisked that bra off so fast, I could barely get the words out, “…but wait…wait! You just were posing (vogue-ing, for crying out loud) in the mirror and said it was good?!?!”
She got a little more calm and just shook her head apologetically: “I can’t do it, I can’t go there. I know what a 36B feels like. I know that pain. I know what that feels like. … I don’t know how to feel in a different size.”
We looked at each other, knowing that it wasn’t really about the bras anymore. There was one of those uncomfortable silences.
“That’s pretty ridiculous, right?” she asked.
“It’s not ridiculous…we all do it,” I said slowly.
“I mean, I know what that feels like,” pointing to her pile.
She turned her head to look at me and asked, “Why do we do that? Why do we hold onto things we know aren’t right?”
“I don’t know. We just do…” I said thinking about something I’ve been holding onto that isn’t serving me well.
“…It is ridiculous,” I added, not really thinking about the bras.
“Maybe we should just let it go.” I said, meaning all of it: the bra size, the conversation, my guilt.
She looked in the mirror again, and then walked toward the bras I had hung on the peg. “You know what? I have enough 36B’s…” She grabbed one, “…I’ll try this,” holding a bra that was the same style as one in her pile.
I helped her put it on. She looked down, then in the mirror, and then reached for her shirt.
“Awesome. Different. I’m going to try it.”
She wore home a different size that day, and I shook something I just couldn’t shake.
Ridiculous.
Hold on to the good,
Joy
