AngrySadTired -- You Probaby Don't Want to Read This

And yet words are necessary to deal with it for me. You might just want to skip this one. Go read another post.

Recently, I was in a gathering of friends and the commentary turned Mardi Gras. A friend of mine is going to a party that requires costumes, and the person he's going with apparently has a costume that displays her rather nice figure rather nicely. Although I don't think he's dating this person, the combination of costume and pulchritude was apparently enough to get his mind going in that direction.

His comment and his awe over her figure just touched a nerve in me that's always raw, but never more than at this time of the year. I swear to God that I am so sick and tired of men and their inability to see beyond T and A that I cannot stand it anymore. I am tired of watching stick figures prance around half clothed on TV. I am tired of watching men ogle every pair of breasts that happens to shape themselves under a shirt. More than any of this, though, I am tired of the physical being the end-all, be-all measuring stick of a woman's worth.

Is there really not one single one of them who isn't looking for a Barbie doll? I mean, really? I am nobody's Barbie doll. I'm built more along the Amazon warrior lines, and stick figure is not a label that could ever have been stuck on me, not even when I was playing basketball in high school and running line drills, laps, and bleachers everyday. I'm really tall, and my body curves. Why can't that be okay, too, with somebody? I have a fierce mind, a strong body, and a brave heart. Why can't that be good, too? Why should I have to have D cup breasts, blond hair, and be the size of a freaking porcelain doll to be attractive?

As of that conversation, I officially give up. I have heard it all too many times now. I have also heard all the palliatives (The right man will find you beautiful; Different people find different things attractive), and I think they're all crap. All the men of my acquaintance chase the same old stereotypes although they may put a different hair color on top. Screw it. In a way, maybe it will be a relief to quit looking. I know my own value, and if they can't see it, then to hell with them all.