I got called a “skinny bitch” yesterday.

True story.

Vivi and I were running errands at the mall.  As we threaded our way through the women’s’ department at Macy’s, I saw two women putting together the sunglass boat in the middle of the floor.  My eyes quickly cast over in their direction before continuing to navigate between the racks and rounders to the elevator.

No sooner than I took my eyes of the pyramid of sunglass boxes, did I hear one of the women call my name.  I turn, and as she’s confidently striding toward me, I realize it’s K, cousin of my really good college friend, A.

“K?” I’m surprised to see her here; I thought she lived out of state. While K and I have a relationship that is tied solely to our relationship to A, I’ve met her enough times to know, she’s got a really grating personality.  She’s brash and brusque, which can be misconstrued as rude. Not to mention insanely irritating.  Actually, it’s not misconstrued. . .she’s brash and brusque and sometimes irritating.

K’s personality runs on one-upping and self-deprecation, with the latter being far from of that “aw, shucks” variety.  She vacillates between talking about eating Snicker bars while laying up on the sofa as she watches A place in a body building contest (true story) and talking about her new promotion (“I hate it”) with no trace of pride, inviting you to ask about it so she can gripe about it.

“I knew I recognized that blonde puff!” she hooted, triumphantly.  Guess I’ll never be a bank robber, what with this hair.  She and I caught up a bit, trading updates on our jobs (her aforementioned promotion), being in RIC (really enjoying it), and how A was doing (amazing).

Then the conversation stalled for a heartbeat.  I mean, I did have things to do, but I didn’t want to be all, “Hey! Bye!” about it. Like I said, her cousin A is a really good friend of mine and I really enjoy their family.  So, remembering that K was a mom, too,  I went on to ask how her little person was doing.

She gave me this chapter and verse, complete with a voice re-enactment, of how her four-year old daughter is effectively running things at their house. K was in full one upping mode because she began with, “You know how your kid does, XYZ? Well let me tell you about mine!”  Evidently, her daughter is the type that makes the Devil say “#@$!,” when her little Stride Rites hit the floor.

United by motherhood, I nodded my head in sympathy to her plight and said, “Oh, I know. I’ve got a 7 year old and 5 year old, too.”

K eyeballed me up, down and sideways. “Skinny bitch!” she cawed.

I don’t remember much else after that.  I was kind of perplexed at the backhanded compliment she had just dished up.  I’m working on taking a compliment with just a simple thanks.  This, however, didn’t feel like a compliment as much as it did an attack. So, I reverted to thanking it away by saying something like, “Oh, please. You see I’m in my work-out clothes. I’m no A, getting all tight and toned for that contest.” With that, I effectively put K back on track with her self-flagellation about her weight, her hair, her kid and whatever else she could offer up to me to look at and point out all the flaws.

It wasn’t until I was at home later on that afternoon that I thought back on what had transpired.  I mean, “Skinny Bitch” is a phrase that gets tossed around quite a bit among women, usually in jest, but there is always a little bite behind it.  As in, “I’m recognizing your relative thinness in comparison to mine and while kudos to you, I’m angry that I’m still struggling.”

I’ve got a friend who has to work exceedingly hard to put and keep weight on.  The first time I heard about her situation, I was all, “Must be nice!”, but I didn’t say it to her face.  Oh, I’ve thought it a thousand times over.  One day, I grew up and realized that I have no idea what she’s going through.  It could be completely exhausting for her, just as it is enervating to me.  We are two sides of the same coin.   I know that she’s not just walking around stuffing her face full of Chipotle, Coldstone Creamery and the like.  She’s doing shakes and lifting weights, and all kinds of combos so that she can look and feel good when she puts on her clothes.  “Look and feel good when [she] puts on her clothes” – – – that sounds really familiar.

K called me a Skinny Bitch, the title of a New York Times best selling book that is a rough and tough approach to weight loss.