fat and lean - more stream of consciousness sketching

Nobody in the house was allowed to speak certain truths, that were - as the Declaration says - self evident (as in "we hold these truths to be," etc.) The proverbial elephant in the room was the absolute and incontrovertible fact that Li'l Jamalyn was not little at all. She was fat, and not just a little bit fat, she was at least five sizes too big for her own good.

At the dinner table Ole Pap was served first, then Li'l Jamalyn, ("Because she is the youngest now, you all shush! " Big Mammy would say.) Then the rest of the menfolk at the table and finally the girls. Not one of the children said a word about the fat little pixie dangling her chubby legs and "accidentally" kicking folks under the table, with her plate piled high while they had little more than a shred of meat and a teaspoon of potatoes. It was taboo. The elephant in the room trumpeted in triumph as the subject was never brought up. To do so would engender a beating, or worse.

Big Mammy was quick to point out the flaws in her daughters - all but Li'l Jamalyn. Though they were skinny as rails you might hear Mammy say things like "Lord have Mercy Sadie, your butt is so big that when you turn sideways it looks like you have two sets of bosoms!" I remember when she put her crooked old hand around one daughter's arms and while shaking her head remarked "No man is going to bed you if you have this fat on you girl. Get to cleaning and burn some of those calories off!" You need to understand that the daughter's arm was hardly as big as six inches around and she was in her late teens. Big Mammy made sure to instill a distorted body image in her elder girls, while building up the boys egos and never letting anyone say a harsh word about her darling Jamalyn.

The Diva was born in Jamalyn early on, and with nary a soul daring to correct it, as you might imagine, the Diva became a narcissistic monster who tipped the scales at well over 300 pounds. Still Big Mammy coddled her and gave her anything she wanted, even if that meant everyone else in the family went without.

Ole Pap divorced Big Mammy after all the children were grown and gone - all but dawdling Li'l Jamalyn. The poor guy did not have any more stomach for the horrific show that played out all day every day. And he had found some sweet young thing who doted on him and so it was time to make his escape. She only wanted him for his money, but that is another story altogether. Anyway, Ole Pap left, only to be tortured and tormented by the two women of his family left to him. Wracked with guilt and rage, he died rather than facing the mess. I guess that is one way to deal with things!

Poor Ole Pap, I wonder if he saw how gleeful Big Mammy was when she got the check left to her in his will? You could feel the earth shake at how angry his new wife was that she got basically nothing, except the duty of cleaning up the mess and tossing all his stuff into the refuse! The other kids just held their tongues and shook their heads.

Big fat Li'l Jamalyn suffers from the belief that her talents are magnificent and that the world owes her a living so she may shine her great light upon beings great and small. Like an enormous Marie Antoinette, she does not understand that others sacrificed so she might prosper - that others went without so that she might eat cake! It is a flaw in her character that runs like the Grand Canyon through her soul. It is tragic in that Southern storytelling kind of way - like the two gals in "The Glass Menagerie," whom the brother abandons in the end and leaves to the strange reality of their mutual madness.

Big Mammy made sure to eradicate Li'l Jamalyn's conscience. Mammy never held Jamalyn to the standard of behavior that was demanded of her other children - she never laid a hand on her baby, but liberally beat the others with all manner of things - shoes, paddles, woodens spoons, belts - she loved to smack her pretty daughters across the face, and cackled with glee that she never left a mark while inflicting the maximum of pain and humiliation! Jamalyn just laughed too - she knew Mammy would protect her and that she could get away with anything.

It is unfortunate that what all this privilege did was ruin a perfectly good human being. What Li'l Jamalyn might have been and might have accomplished was lost many years ago, when Big Mammy coralled her to be the breadwinner, caregiver and nursemaid. It was an odd marriage. In a way, Li'l Jamalyn never had a chance at a "normal" life - she was prepared from day one to be the poor thing she has become.

Pride is a dangerous feeling that we all wrestle with. I have never met anyone with so much foolish and false pride as Li'l Jamalyn. She believes in her own brilliance to the detriment of her ability to function. Because she believes the world owes her, she runs out on her bills and defaults on loans. The Mammy-Jamalyn monster sneaks around from place to place, trading off their identities and hiding from bill collectors. And of course she tells anyone who will listen that poor old Big Mammy was abandoned by her children - without filling in for the listener that she drove them all away. I hope she realizes that most folks have enough sense to observe the obvious - and that not one intelligent soul believes the story, but feel pity for the predicament of the two aging women while running away as fast as they can!

Jamalyn was fat and likely still is. She can't see it like the rest of us can - her eyes were blinded to it from the time she was a babe in arms. Maybe one day she will see through all the lies that are bound around her. I can see them now, wrapped like sticky spider silk that binds her in every direction. She hangs waiting to be devoured in Mammy's web. That was always the plan.

I shudder at her fate.