Chubby and None

As an actress in commercials and corporate training films, I’m usually delighted when my agent calls with an assignment. But this one threw me for a loop.

“I have a print booking for you,” she announced. “Dillards wants to use you for a Mother’s Day ad.”

What I love about my line of work is that you don’t have to be perfect…which is good, because I’m not. In fact, it’s a disadvantage to be outrageously gorgeous if you want to be believable as an expert on laundry detergent or forklift safety, which are the types of roles I typically play. So it’s perfect for me, because in spite of what my husband tells me when we’re dressed up for church on Sunday, I’m really not what you would call beautiful. Perhaps “the happy side of average”, but not actually beautiful.

Or skinny. I’ve never been skinny, which is why a modeling booking made me so nervous.

The ad was to feature a mother and daughter wearing special matching necklaces. The little girl for the photo had already been chosen, and they needed someone who could pass for her mother. The Art Director had chosen me from my agent’s website.

“Great!” I lied convincingly. Remember, I’m an actress.

As a child I was quite overweight, and I suffered in a way that made a permanent mark on my heart from the taunts and teasing of other, more normal-sized children. It’s as if the hurt of being shown that I was unlovable because I had too many chins imbedded in me a lingering fear of being humiliated publicly about my weight. Throughout my acting career I’ve expended enormous energies trying to disguise myself with good haircuts, skillfully-applied makeup and for heaven’s sake, black pants. I have chosen to believe that people are blinded by black. Put on an entirely black outfit and they think you’re 115 pounds.

In spite of the fact that I could feel rising in me the terror of being utterly inadequate for the assignment, I accepted the booking because of the deal I made previously with God: I would never say “no” to an opportunity because of fear of humiliation, and He in turn would not allow my worst and deadliest fat-fears to come true. O.K., so we didn’t actually shake on it. But I was convinced that if I was to achieve in life those things I was meant to achieve, I would simply have to trust enough to face my fears. So far it had worked out pretty well.

I may have been marching into “the valley of the shadow of death”, but I would not be going unarmed. That night, I carefully laid out every conceivable outfit from which the client could choose, hoping that my vast selection of black trousers would fool her (and anyone else on the set) into believing I was younger, thinner and prettier than I was. I had become quite adept at fooling people in this way. (If we had time for a latte I could tell you how I actually learned to climb up a swimming pool ladder backwards, so that no one can see the backs of my thighs while I’m getting out of the pool. Let’s just say it takes some practice to make it look natural.)

It was not until I arrived on the set that I realized the full extent of the danger. The client from the department store was not interested in any of my clothing, but instead had picked out something from the store.

“Over there,” she said, pointing to a clothing rack at the back of the room. “We thought khakis and a polo shirt would work.”

I stared at the rack for a moment, with its single pair of pants and polo, and then looked around the room. Where were the rest of the clothes, the ones I could try on if these didn’t fit me? Where were the clothes in the size I really wear? What kind of an incompetent Art Director reads the stats on an actor’s headshot and takes it for gospel? We’re actors, for goodness’ sake. We lie for a living!

Have you seen Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho”? At that moment, as I stared with horror at that one pair of beige slacks, I swear I could hear those screeching violins, like the sound effects which made the shower scene at the Bates Motel all the more terrifying. The pants seemed to be swaying slightly on the hanger, as if there was a breeze, taunting me.

The photographer’s studio was in one of those cavernous lofts, with an old wooden floor running the length of it, refinished and lacquered to a shine. I held on to my purse with a death-grip, putting one foot in front of the other as I made my way across that long, polished floor and toward those khakis. It was my desire to uphold my end of the bargain with God that had gotten me into this mess, and I knew He was either going to help me or He wasn’t. Without moving my lips, I said in my heart, “God, I do not have Plan B. If you don’t hold me up, I will fall. Period.” I picked up the outfit, and headed toward the dressing room.

Do you understand what I was facing there? If this pair of pants, this lone pair of pants, did not zip all the way up, every nightmare from my tubby and tortured childhood was going to be revisited right there, in front of people who had been promised by my agent that the model they hired would at the very least be able to zip up a pair of pants in the size she swore she wears. Standing in my panty hose in front of the 3-way mirror, I took one last, deep breath and z-z-z-zipped. That zipper went up like it had been buttered. Perfect fit.

Do you know what the odds of that were? I’ll tell you what they were: slim and none, or in my case, chubby and none. I could go to even a high-end department store and try on fifteen, twenty pairs of pants before finding even one pair that could fool anyone. Those pants fit me the way they did because it was not the Art Director who picked them out for me. It was God. He picked them out Himself. There didn’t have to be a second pair.

I can’t say I’ve had many modeling jobs since then, and I’m perfectly happy with that. I’ll stick to selling detergents, thank you. I have, however, made some changes to my wardrobe, adding some brighter colors. And a pair of khaki pants. I think God likes me in khaki.