SCROOGED

I received this short and sweet Christmas greeting from "cleng", a.k.a. Cleo Barawid of Sapporo, Japan on Christmas Day, no less:

"...i wonder what your motive is for posting this here, after all it happened to you long time ago. are you still bitter about it? and there are two sides to every story, right? i just think that it's kinda superficial to attack a person's physical appearance. are you pretty? 'coz from your pix i could see that you are on the heavy side. merry xmas."

I guess my previous post, "NEMESIS", touched a nerve. I am now sharing my response to her comment with all of you, in true Christmas spirit. After all, "'Tis the season for sharing!"


"Dear "cleng", a.k.a. Cleo Barawid of Sapporo, Japan:

Obviously, you chose to ignore the WARNING disclaimer I posted at the beginning of my article, where I clearly stated my motive for writing this piece.

Nevertheless, catharsis has already taken place, and all is well in my world again, so I won't even bother to waste my time asking you where I "attacked" anyone's physical appearance.

I hardly think the words "female", "short", "dusky", "flat-chested", "buck-toothed", and "administrative assistant" are offensive. Descriptive, maybe, but not derogatory. If you happen to think otherwise, then I think you're the one who has issues here, not me.

You obviously think that one cannot be considered "pretty" if one is "on the heavy side". Don't you think THAT reeks of superficiality as well? Shame on you.

I can only guess that you took it upon yourself to attack MY personal appearance, on behalf of all the beleaguered short, dusky, flat-chested, buck-toothed, female administrative assistants out there. How very noble of you to champion their cause.

But just so you know, I also have a lot of friends who happen to be female, short, dusky, flat-chested, buck-toothed, AND administrative assistants. The only difference here is that none of them has ever tried to steal my husband.

Which brings me back to the whole point of the article, which you quite obviously missed. Self-righteous indignation sometimes does this to people.

Assuming you meant it, Merry Belated Christmas to you too."