How much pumpkin pie did you eat?

None for me. Now, don’t jump to conclusions. I’m not on a diet; we had pumpkin bars instead.

I don’t think there’s much reason to hold back at Thanksgiving dinner. And apparently, most of my contemporaries aren’t inhibited at the table, either.

The average woman in the United States is between 5′ 4″ and 5′ 5″ tall, weighs about 147 pounds and is a size 14, according to an article in the November 11 Des Moines Register, “Bigger and Better,” by Renee Lucas Wayne. So why does the average fashion model/movie star/TV sitcom character seem to be about 5′ 10,” 125 pounds and a size five?

Why are all these women so skinny? Maybe they just don’t like turkey and pumpkin pie as much as I do. But I’m guessing they have the Monica syndrome. The Monica I am referring to is Courtney Cox’s character on the NBC sitcom, “Friends.”

I’m thinking of an episode in which Monica went on a date with a guy who had been popular at her old high school, and who she had never had an opportunity to date because she was fat. Monica said something to the effect of, “I owe it to the fat girl inside me to go out with this guy … after all, I never let her eat.”

Is eating that unacceptable? Here I thought it was an important life-sustaining function.

I just wonder, if Monica was still fat, would she be on the show?

Of course, Monica is just a character played by Courtney Cox, who is definitely not fat. So, if Cox was fat, would she be on the show? I’m willing to bet she would not.

However, Lucas Wayne said “big” women are making a comeback on TV. That would be great, except the women that Lucas Wayne classified as “big” aren’t big at all. They’re about average.

Some of the supposedly “big” women on TV are Cybill Shephard, Kirstie Alley, Rosie O’Donnell and Oprah Winfrey. Cybill Shephard, as one of my friends put it, looks like she is not anorexic. She is not big, unless you compare her to Courtney Cox.

I’m wondering if Lucas Wayne ever goes to a shopping mall, supermarket or discount store. If she did, I think she would realize that the average woman looks a lot more like Kirstie Alley than she does Courtney Cox. Nothing against the average woman, mind you, it’s just a fact of life.

The thing is, the average American does not want to see average women on TV, in movies or on the cover of their favorite magazine. So I suppose the first step is to get average women in the spotlight. Then we can move toward above-average women.

It’s fine with me if Americans don’t want average women in the spotlight, as long as they are willing to suffer the consequences.

There’s nothing wrong with being big, unless your size jeopardizes your health or self-esteem.

On the health side, sometimes I think we can go a little overboard. I feel that we’re all going to die eventually, and if I eat 50 grams of fat today instead of the recommended 30 (or whatever it is, I don’t even know), I’ll survive. I don’t recommend eating 50 grams of fat every day, but Thanksgiving dinner is a good time to indulge.

The problem I see with never seeing average women in the media has to do with self-esteem. I think calling Kirstie Alley big could potentially jeopardize my self-esteem.

I never thought of Kirstie Alley as big until I read that article. I would have said she was probably about my size. Luckily, I caught the connection between Lucas Wayne’s definitions of big and average right away.

What if you happen to be bigger than Kirstie Alley? If the ideal is 5′ 6″ and 102 pounds, what are you supposed to think about yourself?

I know several women who always thought they were fat. Now, when they look at pictures of themselves in their “fat” years, they realize, “Hey, I wasn’t as fat as I thought I was. In fact, I was pretty average.”

I think it’s a shame that these women, and women everywhere, have wasted so much of their lives worrying about their weight.

Let’s be a little more realistic. And save some pie for me.

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Catherine Conover is a junior in liberal studies from Mapleton.