Bodies Aren’t Problems. They’re Stories.
It's Christmas Day. I’m lying on my best friend’s couch, watching her cats while she’s home with family. They’re watching me too. Silently judging. This is what dependable looks like.
I’m also working. Writing blog posts. Which is a strange thing to do in an era when no one reads blog posts, but here we are. I shoot film cameras and write blog posts. I enjoy obsolete pursuits. Perhaps I'll take up stamp collecting or Morse code.
Holidays are good for Netflix though. I’m watching Fit for TV: The Reality of The Biggest Loser. I used to like that show. I didn’t know then what I know now, which is that a lot of what we called “transformation” was just physical punishment with corporate sponsors.
The show fixed bodies but ignored minds.
Which is like repainting a car that won’t start.
What surprised me this time wasn’t the sweat or the scale. It was the women talking about their lives when the trainers weren’t shouting at them. Their jobs. Their relationships. What it’s like to be noticed or ignored. What it’s like to be treated like a warning label instead of a person. I was reminded of things I once knew.
I grew up with an older sister. Three and a half years older. It got me a front row seat to how the world explains itself to women. Usually poorly. I watched childhood joy turn into self-consciousness. Individuality turn into a search for acceptance.
I was a big reader as a kid. I read everything. Library books. Comic books. And eventually, my sister’s magazines. Those magazines were full of confident lies:
Lose ten pounds FAST!
Lazy girl workout hacks.
What men notice first.
How to be effortless.
(Which, it turns out, requires constant effort.)
I didn’t know it then, but I was watching an instruction manual being assembled. How women were supposed to look. Act. Behave. Think.
Meanwhile, I was a chubby kid. I grew into what you might generously call a Rubenesque man. This has never been a secret. People have opinions about it. Teenagers on the subway have especially strong ones. Most people don’t know my name. I’m just “big guy.” Other guys get to be "buddy" or "bro," but I don't.
Some people see me and think fat. Some people see what I do and think creep. Neither group usually stays for context. I think about that a lot.
Recently, I met a lovely woman who told me I had great facial structure. She called me handsome, which is always pleasant. She quickly followed that up with “I want people to live their best life” and talked to me about Ozempic. She liked my personality. She liked my face. The body, however, did not make the cut. That part is fine. Attraction isn’t a pre-requisite to talk with me. Nobody owes anybody desire, but words are a choice and they carry weight. And that moment felt familiar in a way I didn’t enjoy. It sounded like something I’ve heard friends and past partners describe. Something you may have heard yourself. If you have, I’m sorry.
“You have a cute face, if you just lost some weight…”
I hate that sentence. I hate how it reduces someone to everything north of the neck. As if humor, intelligence, kindness, resilience are all optional accessories with no value.
Bodies aren’t problems waiting to be solved. They’re record of your life. Some people get tattoos to tell their stories. Bodies do it on their own. Birthmarks are the opening paragraph. Scars are footnotes from moments you survived. Wrinkles are proof you laughed and paid attention. Stretch marks can be the story of motherhood, or growth, or change that happened faster than anyone planned. None of that needs fixing before it deserves to be seen.
There are days I wonder if I should even be in the room. A "big guy" photographing women in vulnerable moments is, on paper, a hard thing to pitch. I worry about how I’m perceived. I worry about making someone uncomfortable before I ever open my mouth or click the shutter. Then I remember something important:
- I know what it’s like to be looked at like a problem.
- I know what it’s like to enter a space already apologizing.
- I know what it’s like to be reduced to a single word and have that held against me.
I do this because I relate to people. Because I have empathy for them and their story, no matter what it is. That’s a big part of why I do this.
The first fifteen minutes of a boudoir session are strange for both of us. I’ve planned everything. The light. The poses. The clothes. The backdrops. And then we’re in the same room, quietly figuring each other out. I’m not afraid because I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m afraid because I care. Because I want to deliver the best images of you I can.
It never fails. When I’m reviewing images from a shoot, I can see the exact moment something shifts within my client. Shoulders drop. Faces soften. Strength shows up. Not because I’m loud. Not because I go "YASS, QUEEN...SLAY". But because nothing is being judged, just observed and photographed. Honored.
Boudoir, as I practice it, isn’t about fixing anything. It isn’t even about confidence. Confidence is unreliable. Some days it shows up. Some days it calls out sick. What I care about is honesty. And safety. And letting someone exist without commentary for a little while.
You don’t need to earn being photographed.
You don’t need to become a smaller version of yourself first.
You don’t need to pretend this is easy.
You just need to arrive. I’ll take care of the rest.
I do this work because I have to. Because I’ve seen what happens when people are told, again and again, that something about them is wrong. And I decided a long time ago not to send that cruelty back into the world.
One of the rules I live by is simple:
To defeat your enemy, you must be nothing like them.
So I choose care.
I choose restraint.
I choose to be decent.
I choose to honor you.
Because you deserve to be seen at all points of your life.
Especially this one.
-Marvin
