on being the "cute" friend

throughout most of my formative young years, i was (sadly) the fat friend. its okay, i've come to terms with it. i've been the same shape since i was about 15, in fact i can still fit most of my clothes from high school (my stylish friends beg me to throw that stuff out since they SWEAR that my platform Spice Girl inspired sneakers will never make a comeback). most women would love to say that they've stayed the same size (14-16) since high school, but mine is a double-edged sword. being the size that i am at 28 years old and a mother is pretty impressive. being the size that i am at the age of 14 was horrifying. and to make matters worse my friends tended to be pretty and stylish. those bitches would drag me into stores like 5-7-9 that only sold sizes up to size 9. bitches. and one friend was even a size 0. oh, the horror.
i remember how my friends would hang out with guys and then bring me along to be the girl to make sure that the guy doesn't try anything. i was always in the next room or if she really didn't want him to try anything they'd give me instructions ahead of time to stay in the room no matter what. and in anticipation that they'd bring me along to cock block, the horny boyfriend would bring one of his guys along to keep me company. of course the homeboy would never be cute. actually, uncuteness i don't mind. the fact that they'd normally have the intellect of a bag of nickles was normally what turned me off. truthfully, i can get with nearly any guy as long as we've got good conversation. and that never happened. so i would be stuck with stupid ugly guys while my homegirls would be making out with their cute boyfriends in the next room. good times.
time was eventually kind enough to let me grow into my weight. by 18 i was a regular in the clubs with my short skirts and low-cut tops. i wasn't typically one to give it up easily, but i looked good enough for guys to wish that i was. as time went on and i met more people, i suddenly became the "cute" friend in my new crew of homegirls. thankfully the attention never really went to my head because in my mind i was still the ugly fat girl from high school. it really wasn't until i was about 24 that i even realized that i was even attractive. yeah, guys hit on me, but i depend more on my personality and making a guy laugh than looks to hook them so i didn't think of my looks as a reason for them to want me. anyway, i'd be out with my less attractive friends (i feel like a total snob saying that) and suddenly a guy that i was eyeballing was suddenly actually eyeballing ME back. when and how the hell did that happen?
but with that attention came something that i never thought would happen. yeah, i got more attention from guys, but was the attention something i wanted? since i know what its like to try to approach someone and have them make you look like a total ass, i make it a point to be polite to ALL men that try to approach me, whether they have a snowballs chance in hell or not. and yeah, i got approached a lot. but those guys didn't ask me what books i read or what kind of music i like. most of them just wanted to know when we could "hang out." and when we did hang out (notice the lack of quotation marks here) we'd simply stare at one another. we clearly couldn't talk about the news or books or politics. because half those ignant bastards didn't know their asses from their elbows.
so i became a woman that suddenly got attention from men, but i wasn't a woman that was born beautiful so i didn't think it was my God-given right to be a bitch to men. so now even when i don't want to be bothered, i still smile and talk and nicely decline giving away my phone number. yeah, the quantity of men increased, but the quality sure didn't. i wanted to be attractive, but now dudes wanna holler just because i've got big boobs and a decent smile. is this what i wanted? men to be attracted to me based soley on how i look. the grass really isn't greener here.