The Corruption of Sizes

I am a vain person - perhaps sometimes even a little too much so. I am also a rather petite sort of person - which is something that I often curse in spite of actually being somewhat lucky that I am. Why? Because I have never had to lie to myself or anyone else about my size. I am something like a size 0-2 American, or size 30-34 European, or size 38 Italian - ok, the Italian is sometimes a little big.

My Italian size has never changed - I've grown sligthly bigger, but I have always basically fit into an Italian size 38 (supposedly a European size 34/American size 4). However, according to European and American sizes I have miraculously shrunk! I weigh more and all my measurements tell me that I cannot possibly have shrunk, nevertheless I've shrunk a few sizes.

I know that some of my friends stand firm that sizes - if anything - have shrunk, so if they are right, I have shrunk even more than just a few sizes. Odd... Back when I was a teenager and probably what some might call skinny, I fit quite well into a size 32 - my only problem back then was that hardly any Danish clothes manufactures made anything that size. But even then a size 34 (Amr. 4) or even a size 36 (Amr. 6) could easily be altered to fit me. Back then there was no such thing as a size 30 or 0 because no adult was that small.

So did we all shrink? No, I really don't think so. The sizes grew! They grew because we chose not to; because our vanities would not allow us to buy bigger sizes. Now I am all for vanity - I believe that we're all vain and rightly should be so. But that kind of self delusion is simply mindless. It doesn't do anyone any good, really, but it does make us appear rather silly. A size 0! What are you? A "nothing"?

How can anyone be a size nothing? I know that I am so much more than that - well, acutally according to most of my recent clothes purchases I am a petite size nothing. I resent that. I am a lot more than that and proud of it!