Those ads.  The all-inclusive resort, azure blue waters, all the beautiful people. I can almost feel the soft tropical wind gently blowing the sarong slouched oh-so-sexy on my hips.

Wait a minute……. where’s the cellulite?  

The woman in the ads; so tall, slender, long-legged beauty, regal with her silken hair blowing in the breeze like a magnificent Afghan hound.  The allure of being that woman when more than a few of us have jiggly little thighs and eye boogers like a Pug.  Thighs with cellulite.

Oh the horrors.  Some of us imperfect women even have flabby arms that will keep on waving like a counterweight to our royal hand waving.   I always thank my Grandma B. for the inheritance of the family silver but not so much for the genetics of her large Swedish flabby underarms.

And what about the guy in the ads? We’re talking about Barbie’s match. Ken with surfer shorts hanging on seductively just below the six-pack. The reality I picture in my mind is of the guy we all know, the guy slightly overweight probably from a different kind of six-pack. The life of the party guy with a loud guffaw launching himself in a cannon ball off the private lanai like a black Lab sailing above the water in the dock diving sport. Big dopey smile on his face as he splashes around those other beautiful people we see romantically lounging in the over-the-water hammock. Groping under them for his Crocs that flew off when he hit the water and floated over as if  magnetically drawn to the horror on their faces.

The advertising worked in that we both sat gazing at the television, yearning for the feel of the warm sand between our toes as we step into turquoise water. The spell was broken when Mark commented that real people don’t look like that.

Right. They forgot the cellulite.