With Friends Like This...

I worked at a women’s clothing store that carried Plus sizes up to 3x. We had some steady customers who were just difficult, and thought we would never notice that they were ‘renting’ clothes and would return them used. These women would search and hunt through the discounted racks, often trying to match several items that they had carried in. I could plainly see that the clothes that they had brought in still had on price tags that were well worn and blurred from body sweat: and without a doubt they would return that over-used piece of clothing and expect to be reimbursed full price.

A pair of them came in, one tall, plus sized overbearing woman who played the return used clothing game and the other one was quiet, petite and also plus sized. Sadly the second woman was barely 5 feet tall and none of the clothes were scaled for her height and fit poorly.

At the checkout counter the overbearing woman gave me a hard time about sales, returns, discounts, and more, just exhausting. But when I turned my attention to her short friend and made suggestions on possibly having custom made some basic slacks, then altering some blouses off the racks, if her budget would allow. Then I went on to kindly tell her that she deserved pretty clothes that looked well on her and hoped that my suggestions would work. I sympathized with her that fashion stores simply ignored all woman built like her, and tried to encourage her that she could look wonderful without being that mythical perfect size 8.

She had tears running down her face, and I kept searching for more kind, encouraging words for her. While I was speaking to her I became very aware that her alleged friend, that large plus-sized, difficult and conniving customer resented that I was paying so much attention to her friend. She was rude to me and a bully to the one who was crying, which made me be even kinder. That short woman deserved so much more, being petite and very overweight is not a crime, just a sad lifelong struggle with her weight, and of course, suffering with a phony and bullying friend who was morbidly obese herself, and certainly had no cause to mock anyone with a weight problem!