Z for Zero

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay. My, oh my, what a wonderful day.

We have come to Zed! My zeal for this zany quest through the alphabet zone has reached its final destination.  I can’t say I’ve zoomed through as it’s taken a little over a calendar year from start to finish, but, let’s face it.  It’s a zoo in there in Alphabetland.  All those letters zipping about in infinite combinations can lead to confusion, but I’ve brought a zestfulness to the endeavor that I’ll hope you’ll appreciate. 

Let’s stop the zig-zagging and zero in on our Z word.  That’s it.  Zero, that is. 

What do you think when you think zero?  Temperature-wise, it’s very cold on either scale, Fahrenheit or Celsius, and something I would prefer to avoid. In mathematics, it represents an empty or vacant position – zero, zip, zilch. As an adjective, it’s used to describe something having no measurable quantity or magnitude. In slang, it means to kill something – zero that dessert, we’re full. When used in reference to a person, it’s less than flattering, labeling them as insignificant or meaningless, even a nonentity.

Getting the picture?  Why then, when it comes to women’s clothing, is 0 the new 10?  Seriously, it is. It seems there’s an inverse relationship between the actual underlying measurements and the arbitrary number ascribed to those measurements.

This got me curious so I Googled to find an interesting article by Julia Felsenthal.  It seems that this whole sizing dilemma got started when the ready-to-wear industry began to boom.  Prior to that, wealthy women had their clothes tailor-made and I’m guessing poor women made most of their own clothing.  Men’s clothing was based on chest size – but that didn’t work for women.  The best proportions to use for us gals were height and weight, but that wasn’t going to fly – can you see walking into Nordstrom and announcing your height and weight to find your size?  Yikes!! So an arbitrary numbering system had to be devised – underlying the numbers were actual measurements of bust, hips and thighs, but these individual measurements were sufficiently obscured to avoid discomfort by shoppers. Over time, with no standards for sizing, manufacturers figured out that if they could label a size 10 as a size 8 they could win repeat customers. Every woman, it seems, is encouraged to aspire to be a lower number. 

The following blurb from Ms. Felsenthal’s article explains a bit more.

“The ASTM recommendations have evolved over time to accommodate a very real trend: vanity sizing. Women don’t want to know their real size, so manufacturers re-label bigger sizes with smaller numbers. In 1958, for example, a size 8 corresponded with a bust of 31 inches, a waist of 23.5 inches and a hip girth of 32.5 inches. In ASTM’s 2008 standards, a size 8 had increased by five to six inches in each of those three measurements, becoming the rough equivalent of a size 14 or 16 in 1958. We can see size inflation happening over shorter time spans as well; a size 2 in the 2011 ASTM standard falls between a 1995 standard size 4 and 6. (This may also explain why smaller sizes are constantly invented. The 1958 standard listed 8 as its smallest size. The 1995 ASTM standard listed a size 2. In 2011, ASTM lists a standard for size 00.)”

From a perfect 10 to a double zero.  What is vanity doing to us?  We are not zeroes nor should we aspire to be.  But we’re not perfect 10s either and that’s as senseless an aspiration. Ignore the number. If it makes you feel pretty, it’s comfortable and it’s in your budget, that’s a perfect fit.

Bernard Baruch, a 20^th century philanthropist and political consultant, said that “no man should think himself a zero, and think he can do nothing about the state of the world.”  Make that “no person should think him/herself a zero…” and I would agree. 

We’re not numbers and we’re certainly not zeroes. We’re beyond quantification, simplification, explanation.  We are a profound mystery. Infinite, boundless, beautiful.

As we reach the end of A to Z, I leave you with this Apache blessing.

May the sun bring you new energy by day, may the moon softly restore you by night. May the rain wash away your worries, may the breeze blow new strength into your being. May you walk gently through the world and know its beauty all the days of your life.