OVERLOOKED

It's easy to judge others for being shallow, for allowing aesthetics to take precidence over substance and things of true importance; like personality, intelligence, values and ultimately love. But when you're faced with the reality of a situation where your own reactions to imperfection are put to the test, you'll probably be ashamed.

I was at the supermarket today and there's always someone to fancy at the supermarket. Such a mixture of people of all ages, from all walks of life - are buying what they need. (I also happen to be in America at the moment, there seems to be a smaller class divide in the supermarkets here. Forget inviting the chavs to Asda and overpricing Sainsburys so that only the middle class can afford it - everyone comes together for the weekly grocery shop in the states!) As I perused the wines, a man walked past me wearing hospital scrubs. (I'm assuming he was a nurse, not an inpatient escapee.) He was so beautiful. Probably early 30s, short dark hair, a smattering of 5 o clock shadow, brown eyes and gorgeous bone structure, he looked like Matthew Fox. I did the double take thing, watched him walk past in flip flops; he seemed to notice me and I caught his eye for a second before we both looked away. It was the usual mutually appreciative glance, that even when you're only window shopping, is quite a thrill. The fact that he was a nurse just seemed to make him even more attractive to me - I imagined his caring nature, coupled with the look he gave me, of 'I'd definitely know what to do with you, given half the chance'... let's just say I was happy to imagine it.

He's fully pliable... and comes with all the right instruments! Or does he?

He disappeared down another aisle and temporarily I forgot about him (like I said, I'm not on the market - he really was just viewing pleasure). But then a bit later, I was browsing something else and he came towards me and stopped a few feet away, looking at something on the shelf. I found myself captivated again. 'He must know how good looking he is', I thought. 'He probably gets stared at all the time'. I let my eyes wander over his body to take in the rest of him and there it was, as plain as day (I now believe the only reason I'd not noticed it before was because his beautiful face was so distracting) - his left arm was completely deformed. It was at least twelve inches shorter than the other, there was no hand to speak of, but what looked like something that had once started to develop into one and his arm was probably half the width of a normal one and grew narrower towards the end. It literally looked like a small branch from a tree.

I averted my gaze immediately and before I'd even had chance to mentally process a conscious decision about whether or not I still found him attractive, I'm ashamed to say my body had already made the decision for me. The thrill was gone. I didn't have that longing to catch his eye anymore, any fantasies about what I'd like to have done to him simply vanished without notice. It sunk in. I cursed myself for being so superficial. Was it just the shock, I wondered? You just don't expect to see something like that. It's normal to be a little bit - put off, at first... I so badly wanted to prove to myself that this didn't matter and that if I had been 'on the market' and he'd have asked me out, that I would have said yes and that we might have had as enjoyable sex as we would if he had two perfect arms like anyone else. That I wouldn't have cringed if I'd had to touch it and that when we went out, it wouldn't bother me if other people noticed. I had to admit to myself that I couldn't prove any of this or even suggest it to myself. I wanted to so badly, but I couldn't.

I glanced at him again. He was conventionally beautiful in every other respect, there was no doubting that fact. But I couldn't look at him for long anymore; not because I didn't want to, not even because of his arm, but because I was now paranoid that if he saw me looking, he wouldn't think I was admiring him - but that I might be thinking he's a freak! Which I wasn't; the word freak never crossed my mind anyway... at this point I was all too engrossed in trying to fathom my reaction and kicking myself for being so shallow! Why are we so conditioned to only accept and tolerate normality and perfection? We can't achieve it ourselves, abnormalities aside - no-one has a body they're completely happy with. And yet we still can't easily come to terms with something that's more out of the ordinary than usual.

American style shopping bags, not great when you've only got one good arm... (But will you look at that baguette!!)

I'm the last person to ever consciously make someone feel inadequate. As someone who spent most of my school life being bullied, I don't tolerate any kind of humiliation, especially of the aesthetic description. But am I really any better than someone who would single someone out in the street and laugh and point at them? If I can't feel towards someone with a physical deformity, the way I would feel towards anyone else - then aren't I as bad?

Maybe I'm being too hard on myself. It's not that I expect anyone else to feel differently. We're all conditioned the same way, unless we're one of the people who has to live with something that makes them so different. But even if I'm just the same as everyone else, even if it just merely makes me human to be deterred by what's not the fittest, the most attractive or the healthiest - it still makes me ashamed to admit it. Because we should be evolved enough to see past all that, shouldn't we? The fact that I was eyeing him up for so long in the first place, is testament to the fact that I am preoccupied with perfection and anything I deem to be beautiful. I can't decide if it's wrong, or just how we're programmed. But either way, I am not particularly comfortable with it.