My friend Kashia is Penny and I’m Baby. At least that’s what we’ve decided following a recent screening of the cult classic Dirty Dancing. As with all movies of this genre (where you leave mentally scheduling salsa lessons only to forget about it the next day), Dirty Dancing leaves you fantasising over the fit physiques and toned bodies of its stars – and we’re not talking about Patrick Swayze.
Kashia and I didn’t have to argue about which body we’d get to ‘have’. She’s tall and athletic and I’m petite and lean – so it was sorted, she could be dance-anista Penny and I’d be the oh-so-cute Baby. Sure, we’d eaten a hot dog and a box of popcorn each during the screening but we rationalised that if we ate less and moved more (genius, no?) that it is within the realms of possibility that we could look like these screen goddesses.
Previously our body icons have been Katherine Heigl (her) and Jennifer Aniston (me). Now if you’re starting to think we’re a wee bit loco (superficial, yes, crazy not so much), then you’ve missed the fabulous good news story in this for all of us. In this crazy messed up world of warped body image and negative eating patterns, we’ve managed to recognise the thing that can liberate women from a love/hate relationship with her body – we come in all shapes and sizes. With such radicalism I’m practically the Che Guvera of the weight-loss world. I can rattle off 30 celebrities that have great bodies, with not one having the same proportions, measurements, size or body shape.
My very crude analysis is taken to all sorts of new levels by something as credible as science. My petite frame, that can gain and lose weight quickly, build muscle easily and has broad swimmer shoulders? Well, I’m a mesomorph. Which is fortunate as the endomorphs have a much tougher time of it – if you’ve heard a friend complaining she’s not dropped an inch even after thrice weekly gym sessions, chances are these are her people.
Traditional Indian natural medicine, or Ayurveda, has a view of its own. We’re either a Pitta, Kapa or Vata – each with their own tendencies towards weight gain. Dress-for-you-shape gurus Trinny & Susannah are less interested in why you look like you do, and more concerned with making your body look its best, courtesy of their BBC corporate credit card. In their most recent book, The Body Shape Bible, these lasses manage to identify 12 different body shapes – and being a ‘cello’ isn’t as bad as it sounds.
But back to Penny and Baby. My ‘we all look different and that’s a good thing’ thesis has helped me accept I’ll never ‘wear’ clothes like Kate Moss does (memo to Calvin Klein: women have boobs), or ‘have legs up to here’ like Elle Machpherson. But it’s OK because there are plenty of oh-so-hot celeb bodies that I can healthily aspire to without the need for rib removal or leg lengthening implants. Kylie Minogue, Sarah Jessica Parker, Eva Longoria and my old friend Jennifer Aniston are all sexy women rocking the five foot and a few inches club.
Of course with my previously mentioned movie watching/popcorn eating habits, I don’t have the fabulous body of any of them. But for the other 80% of the time I spend on the healthy eating and exercise bandwagon, I can be motivated in a not-too-messed-up fashion that my shape can be hot and if I go to the gym and put down the hot dog, then it’s there within my reach. Meanwhile, it’s been almost a week since Kashia and I made our Dirty Dancing declarations – and of course we’ve not been near a dance class or done a single sit up between us…. we’re without a Patrick Swayze type you see.
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