Fat philanthropy

"I've never seen so many obese women as I have this year."

The setting: an annual convention for a women's philanthropic organization. The speaker: a woman who considers herself obese, but maybe not quite as obese as some of the others here.

Since I'm not a member of the organization, this wasn't my scene and these weren't my people, so it wasn't my place to say anything. Since I'm fairly fit and haven't ever had to struggle with weight, it's unfair for me to criticize. But she had verbalized what I was thinking: Many of these women are very wide. Depending on the fit of their clothes, they are also lumpy in unusual ways.

I was just there to be with my mom, who has been as active member of this organization for 67 years. (For the record, she is quite thin, having lost weight after Dad died last February. They had been married 63 years.) And yet I was grumpy about being there.

I struggled with this grumpiness because it had emerged from a murky corner of my heart. I was judging the convention women for their size, for the Middle America way they dressed, their earnestness, their whiteness. (Of about 600 participants, I noted two women of color.) I judged them by this overheard bit of conversation: “Then I go, ‘I’m running out of teddy bears!’” Maybe I judged them for the banality of the venue, an "Events Center" billed as Loveland, Colorado, but which was in fact an Embassy Suites next to a Budweiser arena and the Larimer County Fairgrounds. The complex teeters on the edge of the eastern plains of Colorado, which is to say the setting is flat and brown. From there on to the east lies the Land of States Lumped Together in the Middle. (This is a smug left-coast bias, of course: As mom has said, Anything inland from the California coast is "Back east.")

Maybe I judged them for their slowness, their tendency to walk at a leisurely pace from room to elevator to conference rooms to complimentary happy hour. (They may have stepped it up for the latter. No judgment there.)

And indeed, when one woman complained of feeling sluggish, I suggested some fresh air.

"That's probably it," she said. "I don't think I've gotten out of this hotel since we got here."

That was Sunday. They had arrived Tuesday.

Here's the thing. In this contentious political season, I strongly support those on the side of peace and justice, diversity and tolerance. I'd like conservatives to back off and let LGBT people, for example, live their lives; I'd like Christians not to impose their values on personal decisions and government business. If I lump these women together as I do the Lumpy States, aren't I being hypocritical as well as judgmental?

I started to come around by the end of the weekend, though. After all, these are my mother's people, and my mother is a smart woman (whom I love even though we don't agree on political issues, which we do not discuss).

At the final banquet, the incoming president and her board were installed, in her words, "wearing pretty dresses" and "bling." I'm not one for Disney princesses, so this was not my thing.

I wasn't expecting to be bowled over by what came next.

And that was the money. They announced in some detail and with greatly deserved pride how much they have raised for St. Jude's Children's Hospital in the past year. Each state was recognized for the thousands of dollars they had contributed--hundreds of thousands for some, and for a few, over a million dollars. Since 1972, when they first adopted the hospital as their special interest, they have raised over 200 million dollars. That's money that goes into research for childhood cancers. That's money that saves the lives of children. These women clearly are more than tacky clothes and tedious meetings. They effect real and positive change in the world, Ms. I'm Too Fit for This, and they can walk as slowly as they damn well please.