And that's why you don't become a gymnast

Today, I popped a rib by NOT making the bed. I calmly moved towards the bed to begin making it, but then figured, Nah, I'll do this AFTER I exercise. And then, I calmly walked away from the bed. No sudden movements, no being startled, no overly dramatic sneezing - I simply walked away. And then I was stabbed in the back. Repeatedly. By knives. Or ice picks. Or axes. Or by a gang of small pixies wielding knives or ice picks or axes. (I'm now imagining Terry Pratchett's Nac Mac Feegles beating the shit out of my back.)

Rob Anybody, a Nac Mac Feegle 
(art Paul Kidby)

The first time I popped a rib was when Rissa was still in a stroller and I was carting that stroller up and down our front steps in East York. So that means that this shit has been going on for the last 19.5 years. 

At my inaugural chiropractor appt. almost 2 decades ago, the doctor asked, "By any chance were you a gymnast?" as she gave me a sad, the-damage-is-done smile. Apparently I am now TOO flexible. Who knew that my eight years as a recreational gymnast would completely fuck me over in middle-age? Most physio therapists and chiropractors. 

Like most girls who saw Nadia Comaneci in the '76 Olympics, I fell in love with the idea of being a gymnast, but after nearly a decade in recreational gymnastics, my top skills amounted to a back walkover on the balance beam and a back handspring on floor. I couldn't kip on the bars for shit. I was by no means an elite athlete. I can't even imagine the chronic issues that Olympic level athletes deal with, if my hypermobility pulls this kinda crap. 

I pop ribs maybe 3 (or 4 or 5... the most is 6) times a year. By doing such taxing things as bending over to dry my hair, reaching for the shower gel, sneezing. My friend thinks that the gravitational pull of my breasts is the cause. According to her, I might not be moving quickly, but, because my breasts are in their own orbit, other intra-corporeal bodies (ie ribs and ligaments) are pulled out of alignment by my innate breastal gravity. I think that this sounds like a perfectly reasonable justification.

Because this delightful little trait has been kicking in more frequently over the past couple of years, I decided to be proactive and strengthen my back with yoga - you know, so that I can avoid this shit in the future. Apparently, my one month's worth of strength yoga hasn't afforded me its full benefits yet. This may be compounded by the fact that I haven't actually talked to any sort of medical professional about this issue, because... pandemic.  So I don't know whether my version of strengthening my back jibes with what someone who actually knows how bodies work, might think. 

And, as I've been reading today, in between popping muscle relaxants, it sounds like I probably have "Slipping Rib Syndrome." WAIT! WAIT!!! If I add this to my four other health idiosyncrasies (Hashimodo's Disease, Meniere's Disease, Hypoglycemia and Migraines),  I think I've got the Weird-Ass Medical Disorder Bingo!! Boo-freaking-yeah baby!  Bright side!

Is it pore cleansing or waxing your nose?

WARNING: Pores and the things that come out of pores are featured in this post. There is a used Bioré strip pic... and links to videos. You've been warned.

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Those Bioré nose strips? Is that accent aigu real? I mean, is it actually French or is it like Hӓagen-Dazs where they decided to make it sound fancier and European for the cachet of it all? Do we inherently trust the French with our faces?? 

Okay, so I Googled it - it is, in fact, a Japanese company. Why isn't the Japanese-sounding company offering us beautifying facial products?? Is this really just North Americans believing that French-sounding products are better for our faces? Has it just been propaganda? Have we all been propaganda-ed? 

The top 10 cosmetics companies are:  L'Oréal, followed by Gilette, Nivea, Estée Lauder, and Clinique, which make up the top five. They are followed by Guerlain, Shiseido (which IS Japanese), Pantene, Dove, and Garnier. Only three of these companies are truly French: L'Oréal, Guerlain and Garnier. But eight of them fucking sound French, right?

I got sidetracked. The nose strips. The wet-your-nose-let-the-charcoal-coating-dry-peel-off-all-your-blackheads strips. The satisfying perusal of the strip after you've removed it when you see all your pore guck on it. And you feel fresh and clean and like nobody will be focusing on your blackhead laden nose - which they won't, because do you know how close you'd have to actually be to see whether or not they have embedded guck in their pores?  Even discounting our present COVID restrictions - people do NOT get that close to each other, unless they're intimate partners, and frankly, even then, I would hope that you'd be focused on other shit if that was the case. Unless that's your kink, and as long as it's consensual, fill your little boots.

With my middle-aged eyes, I'm unsure whether I'm actually removing clogged pores or if, in addition to aaaaaaaall the other body hair that I am now sprouting, I'm ripping out hair that just so happens to reside on top of my nose. Because why wouldn't that be another thing that happens to women in menopause? But please tell me it's not that. I mean, when I actually find the lone, minute, whiskery white hair on my nose I immediately pluck that fucker out. So it's not like an entire forest of nose hairs would spring forth overnight, right? Maybe I should 5X magnify my nose more regularly.

Or maybe I should just be happy that the gunk that's coming out of my pores is relatively small enough that I can mistake it for a very, very, fine wispy hairs. 

Could be pore guck, could be teeny tiny hairs.

And then of course I had to google comparatives.  My pore gunk (or nose hairs) look positively dainty compared to some of the crap that's coming out of other people's pores. Google it yourself - there are tonnes of make-you-dry-heave images out there.

And now I'm down that rabbit hole. It's the combined fascination / horror / nausea that keeps me clicking links.  I've now discovered these: 

BESTOPE Blackhead Remover Pimple Popper Tool Kit Acne Comedone Zit Blackhead Extractor Tool for Nose Face, Blemish Whitehead Extraction Popping, Stainless Steel with Metal Case

Surprisingly, even with the display of its accoutrement of tools (dry heave), it is relatively innocent and non-graphic. Plus its pseudo-porn-soundtrack is enjoyable.

And this: 

Blackhead Vacuum, AsperX 5.0 Megapixels Visible Blackhead Remover Facial Pore Vacuum, 20X Microscope Blackhead Suction Tool, Rechargeable Suction Facial Pore Cleaner with 6 Replaceable Tips (Upgraded)

It has an internal camera!! WITH 5.0 MEGA-FUCKING-PIXELS!!! So of course I had to find a video where they actually tried it. This is train wreck material. 
  

DANGER WILL ROBINSON!!! DANGER! NO, WILL ROBINSON!!
 

Even for a great ape like me who gets off on this sort of crap, I say this: Watch at your peril.

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Depending on the size of the vacuum aperture (sucker) that you put on, they should maybe be marketing this as a different type of appliance.

Downward Braless Dog

With my head tucked, my oversized Aerie shirt slides up over my face. I feel the butter-soft skin of my tatas against my chin. My line of sight is drawn between my breasts and I can't help but note their ovular shape. I snort. But then I stop, because it takes me out of the 'moment' with my virtual yoga instructor. Where is my breath supposed to be? Is it in my heels? My shoulders??  

My breasts are really soft. I mean, how often does a straight, middle-aged woman get to feel naked breasts upon her face? Well, not my whole face. It's not like they're so woobly that I can feel them on my cheeks (I am, after all, only a D cup), but my chin is totally digging the whole breast experience. I can see why David sounds the way he does when his head rests upon my chest. 

Why did I decide to do yoga in my pajamas?

Shit. Am I INhaling or EXhaling? Feet! My feet are supposed to be between my hands. Folding. I am now folding. And sweeeeeeeeeping up and arching and folding again. And planking and cobra-ing and pushing back into... my breasts upon my chin. I look weird from this angle. I'm like the back end of a goat. But I don't need to be milked. If I were lactating, these breasts would be magnificently firm!!  I snort again.  Steve the cat comes to investigate. He winds his way back and forth under my downward facing dog and head butts my low-hanging fruit.

"Dude... Distracting." He chirps and rolls onto his back, doing his version of corpse pose beneath me. Fuck. I missed the folding. I nudge Steve with my foot as I come back to standing. Arching... folding... planking... But really? All I'm aiming for is to get back to downward dog to celebrate the majestic softness of my boobs. 

Oh yeah. They are so fucking soft.  I want to experience this on a regular basis. How long can I hold downward dog without passing out? My chin is so happy. I sigh. Focus would be an issue. I started yoga up again to center myself and deal with stress. Topless yoga would be counter-productive. But. SOOOOOOOO. Soft. My eyes close and I relax my shoulders. Find my inner...

EGYPTIAN COTTON!!!!

I barely manage to finish my yoga session before I run to my laptop and order Egyptian cotton sheets from Amazon.  They will be here tomorrow. I will be naked in them. And more than my chin will be happy.

I spent HOW much at No Frills??

"That will be $232.31 - would you like to use your $10 reward from your PC points?" says the teenager cashier at No Frills.

"I'm sorry it was HOW much?"

"$232.31." 

"Yes. Yes, I would like to use my $10 in reward points." I say as calmly as I can, while inside my head I am yelling at the top of my lungs:

"HOLY FUCKING SHIT! TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY-TWO FUCKING DOLLARS!?!"

(And just so we're all clear here - I am shopping for two, count 'em TWO people now.)

Last week I made the mistake of shopping at Walmart for groceries - which I don't usually do, because I always spend too much, on account of the fact that I don't know my way around the grocery part of the store and I always see shit that I don't need, but I suddenly desperately want. I had gone for the cheap cans of red and green Thai curry - but had ended up with a quick dry sports bra, a vintage Queen t-shirt, 3 types of gluten free bread products, 2 body washes (on sale), waffle fries (fucking waffle fries?!?), and rice and pasta alternatives, because I might as well stock up so that I didn't have to go back the next week.

While in Walmart, I could feel myself leaning into a panic attack. You know, because all of a sudden you look around and see that everyone in the store is wearing masks and you realize you're trapped in some weird-ass sort of sci-fi version of your life where you haven't been able to see your parents in forever because they're old and you might kill them from the pandemic that's been in Canada for almost a year? That kind of panic attack? The Musac playing over the speakers was All By Myself - not the Celine Dion version, but the original by Eric Carman. Instead of jamming out to it in a delightfully campy air drumming solo à la Bridget Jones's Diary, I found myself fighting the urge to lie in the middle of the vitamin aisle making floor angels while hysterically sobbing.

So this week? No shopping at Walmart. It is No Frills. I will be in and out in 20 minutes. I bring three bags in with me, which is overkill, because there are only eight items on my shopping list (milk, peppers, ground meat, apples, unsweetened chocolate, cheese, sour cream and cottage cheese) - and there is no way that I will have to use all three bags. But I approach the check out lane (63 minutes later) and see that there are WAY more than eights items in my cart - certainly more than three bags will hold, so I ask for a couple more. After paying the $222.31 for the food, I'm in some sort of fugue state as I pack up everything - unsure as to what the fuck I have purchased. I mean, as I'm seeing the items in my actual hands I have no idea what they are and what they've cost. 

On the drive home, all I say is "$222.31, $222.31, $222.31..." like some sort of weird fucking mantra. Even as  the groceries are unpacked on my kitchen counter, I still cannot comprehend what went wrong. Then I look at the receipt, particularly for the higher ticket items.

$7.97 Kitty Litter - wasn't on my list, but... on sale this week! We have three fucking cats, extra fucking kitty litter is a necessity. 

$10.00 Hot chocolate mix - because David loves his hot chocolate and although we are not out yet, by the end of the week we probably will be, depending on how cold the fucking weather is.

$9.47 Decadent Milk Chocolate Chips - see point above, but change "hot chocolate" to "fucking  chocolate chips."

$10.00 Smoked Salmon - but it was for three smaller packs that, yes, are a fucking luxury, but I really like smoked salmon and the per portion price is very fucking reasonable and $10.00 is much cheaper than buying a fucking new pair of shoes.

It goes on and on. And not just higher ticket items. Whipping cream? Why the fuck do I need whipping cream? Because I might make something that will require it. Maybe. Not sure what it will be, but I have read a bunch of fucking recipes this week and I'm sure that one of them had whipping cream in it. Two types of fucking ice cream - one for David and lactose free coconut ice cream for me. Because there is no ice cream in the house and can we not have something sweet as a fucking pick-me-up?!? Licorice tea - which is FUCKING soothing, even if we have six other fucking herbal teas in the cupboard already.

When I add up all the things that were not on my shopping list, but were either just good to have on hand for when I would need them, or sounded like something David might want as a treat or I might like to snack on right when I got home... (Dill Pickle Quaker Fucking Mini Rice Cakes) I realize that I have spent $195.07 more than I needed to today. 

"ONE HUNDRED AND NINETY-FIVE DOLLARS AND SEVEN FUCKING CENTS!?!"

What the actual fuck? I mean, I know that we'll eat it all, but almost two hundred dollars more than I needed to spend? What the fuck went wrong? What was I doing? I can tell you what I wasn't fucking doing, I wasn't actually looking at my fucking shopping list while I was at fucking No Frills. And what I also wasn't doing? I wasn't purchasing ONLY the things that were on that fucking list. 

Oh Jesus... I went up and down all the aisles. ALL of them. You don't do that at the grocery store! You get in and you get the fuck out - that is your mission when you shop. It's not a fucking invitation to lose your mind and buy whatever the fuck you want!!  Give me just a second while I bang my head on the table.  (Deep breath. Shoulders back.)

The good news? Now I can whip some fucking cream (that isn't in ANY way lactose-free) to put on my lactose-fucking-free coconut milk ice cream which I can then cover in salted fucking caramel sauce. 

You put your snorkel where?!?

It's the cannabis fudge. That's why we're laughing. (Also, this may have been the first time in his life that David has ever truly been high, because I gave him just a titch more fudge than I ingested - you know, because he's taller and slightly heavier than I am.) We're laughing so hard that our abs are aching. ALL the obliques, ALL the rectuses ALL the intercostals.

"I can't breathe!! I can't breathe!!" I gasp.

David lets forth another guffaw of laughter. "You must be breathing!" He looks at me very seriously. "If you weren't breathing, you'd have passed out." Now, in a whisper, "You'd. be. un. conscious."

This sends me off into paroxysms one more. "STOP! STOP!!

"How ARE you breathing?" he asks.

"Through my vagina."

"Really?" He looks skeptically at my lap.

"I have a snorkel down there."

This confuses his eyebrows. "You have a snork-o-vag?"

"A...???"

"Snork-o... No... that doesn't sound right, does it? Snork-gina!!" He starts laughing madly once more.

"What? What?!?"

"I'm just imagining the cartoon version of that character. BWA-HA-HAAAAAAA!!! THE CLIT WOULD BE THE NOSE!!!!" Another thought hits him. "Wait... wait... VA-JORKEL!!!"

"Va-jorkel??"

"Vagina snorkel. You're welcome."

"VAAAAAAAAJORRRRRRKEL." I have the perfect song in which this word may be utilized most effectively.

♩♬ VA-JORKEL SONGS FOR VA-JORKEL CATS!! ♫
♬♩ VA-JORKEL SONGS FOR VA-JORKEL CATS!! ♩
♩♬ VA-JORKEL SONGS FOR VA-JORKEL CATS!! ♫
♬♩ VA-JORKEL SONGS FOR VA-JORKEL CATS!! ♩

David is amazed and is most certainly contemplating how he can have me canonized. And then, very quietly, he starts to sing.

♬♩ BE-CAUSE VA-JORKELS ARE AND VA-JORKELS DO ♫
♩♬ VA-JORKELS DO AND VA-JORKELS WOULD! ♩
♬♩ VA-JORKELS WOULD AND VA-JORKELS CAN! ♫
♩♬ VA-JORKELS CAN AND VA-JORKELS DO!!! ♩

Okay, number 1? David can sing - which always makes me happy, but even more so now because I am stoned and my ears are in ecstasy at the way the notes are leaving his throat. And B? After singing this particular refrain, he then recites for me the The Naming of Cats, in its entirety, in this deep, sonorous, over-the-top-sexy voice. Right beside my ear.

"How is it that I have never known you could do that?" I ask breathlessly.

David shrugs.

"In 22 and a half  years of marriage, how did I NEVER know that you were THAT kind of musical theatre geek?"

David looks chagrined.

"I'm not complaining," I assure him. "I mean, I wouldn't have a leg to stand on with my own musical theatre geekness... but all these years you could have been whispering T.S. Elliott poetry into my ears...?"

"It's not like I had a CATS costume in my closet or anything," he says.

"Anymore..." I snicker.

"I didn't!! I don't!!"

"But if you did??"

"Mr. Mistoffelees. Obviously. He can light up his own costume."

***

It's only now, reading this back, that the awkwardness of VA-JORKLE is evident. VA-JICLE would have scanned much better in the song's rhythm but is nowhere near as funny to say out loud. 

The Humpback near the Cenotaph

I swear I was not being intentionally disrespectful. I just couldn't take it any more.

Earlier in the day:

"Hoorah! I have received my shipment of Humpback Posture Correctors!!" (There's a sentence every woman wants to utter.) It's been a process folks. After having purchased 6 different styles of posture correctors - each of which was either the wrong fit/size/comfort-level, I finally found these:

In addition to supporting my devolving posture, these babies give a nice added lift to the girls. 

It just may be possible that I'm not thinking logically when I don my Women Chest Brace Up yesterday. I recognize now, that wearing a garment that thrusts one's shoulders back might not be the best course of action when one has displaced an upper rib while drying her hair that morning. 

I am excited though. 

"THIS IS IT!! THIS IS THE DAY THAT I TAKE MY BACK...   BACK!!"

Months of terrible typing posture are going to be rectified. I strap that sucker on and revel in its mild armpit discomfort. By dinner, apart from the near-constant, minor back ache, I have forgotten that I 'm wearing it.

David and I go for our post-dinner perambulation, enjoying the crisp night air. My posture? Spec-fucking-tacular! My shoulder blades? Done. 

A half hour from our house, the comfort-seeking choreography begins. The wiggling of the shoulders, the walking pelvic tilt, the attempts to round out my back stymied by the persistent pull from the 85% Nylon and 15% polyester fibres yanking at my armpit region.

"You okay?" asks David.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm good. I think that..." (shoulder jiggle, breast shimmy) "maybe I should have taken off my Posture Corset before we left the house."

"Didn't you put a rib out this morning?"

"Yeah."

"Why are you wearing a Posture Corset then?!?"

"I thought it was a good idea at the time?" I say as tried to release my shoulders again.

"How long have you been wearing it."

"Like seven hours?" We are now approaching the cenotaph in our downtown park - lit with billions of lumens to ensure that local hoodlums will shy from it.

"You need to take that off ASAP."

We pass the cenotaph, and head up towards King Street. I get about 20 feet away and I go temporarily insane.

"Nope! Can't! CANNOT DO THIS!!!" I unzip my coat and begin to struggle with my zippered sweater (for extra winter warmth) underneath. The zipper sticks. "ARGH!!!"

"Whoa! Whoa!" says David.

"Can't!! Now I'm trapped! I'm TRAPPED in my sweater AND my Bra X Strap Vest!!! I'm going to DIE here!! I can't see anything!!!"

David fumbles for my zipper in the near-dark.

"Oh for the love of... There is a light source brighter than the sun right behind us!" I walk over into the cenotaph's light and manage to unzip my sweater and pull up the long sleeved shirt beneath it - revealing my bra and posture corrector to the world. I reach for the three massive hooks under my boobs and David quickly steps in front of me to offer some spousal shielding, though frankly at this point, I wouldn't care if our entire town saw me topless, I just need the sucker unhooked.

"Oh thank God. THANK GOD!" I say, ecstatic from the near-orgasmic release of tension in my shoulders. "Thank you, thank you, thank you..." I hug David. "So good. It feels so fucking good."

"Okay. Simmer down there..."

We have decided that the implementation of the Prevent Chest Hunchback should be done in baby steps. Or at least until my rib goes back to where its supposed to live.

MOLES? We don't need no stinking MOLES!

Is mole DNA similar to rabbit DNA? And by "mole" I mean a mole on your face or body, and by rabbit I mean literal fucking rabbits. If you have two moles on your face, do their melanocytes then multiply exponentially like the proverbial rabbit? Is my face now a Ponzi Scheme?

Last year I had one small mole on my forehead, which I totally thought was a zit, but it wasn't, because no matter how hard I tried to pop it, nothing happened. Then another one showed up on my forehead and another, then one on my cheek and then two more on the opposite cheek. And now there are two others that have developed beside my mouth. 

If, over the past year, my one benign mole (because, yeah, I checked that shit out with a dermatologist) has become eight, I'm fairly certain that within a decade I will become the Mole-Faced Woman. The upside of this eventuality is that it can, and should, be monetized. 

Today? My skin melts. I go upstairs to pluck my chin, neck and face hairs (because THAT'S a daily thing now) and my skin has slumped like melted wax. My thought process goes like this:

"WHAT THE FUCK HAS HAPPENED TO MY FACE?!?"

I try to recall all the things that I've done so far over the course of the morning that might contribute to a House of Wax moment upon my person, but it takes me a full 90 seconds of panicked thought before I calm down enough to realize that they are just slinkles (sleep wrinkles). That calm is lost when I realize that those slinkles remain embedded in my skin four fucking hours after I have stopped sleeping on my face AND and I have no recollection of even seeing my face this morning, even though logic says that that shit had to have been there earlier, like WHEN I WOKE UP.   

Do you know that they make pillows for this? To avoid slinkles. They look like the kind of pillow you might wind up on if you have cervical trauma. For $174.00 + tax you can sleep the sleep of the uncomfortable so that your face at least slumps backward while you sleep.

Whenever I mention any of these things to David or Rissa they look at me like I'm nuts.

"Nobody notices this stuff but you."

"Uhhhhhh.... not true. Every other menopausal woman out there notices this shit."

"On themselves maybe, but not on other people. You have to be VERY close to other people like REALLY close to notice what YOU see in a mirror with 5X magnification."

I can't fault this chain of thought. No one other than David and Rissa gets that close to me - especially now, with all the physical distancing and mask wearing. In spite of laser eye surgery, David's eyes don't even really work that well up close and personal and Rissa repeatedly tells me that I am crazy and that I'm beautiful the way I am and I should just accept that fact.   Plus, with me already starting to forget shit? I'm not going to remember what my original face looked like. So the next time I gaze into my 5X magnification mirror, I can just be happy that I own one that helps me locate that mother-fucking white hair on my neck that I've been playing with for the last hour as I've been watching The Crown.

Accept no substitutes

"Mom, Sean Connery died."

"What? Oh no! When?"

"This morning. He was 90."

"Oh... well, that's a good long life, but still very sad."

"Yeah, it is. I know he was your favourite."

"Yes, yes, definitely him, then Daniel Craig."

David pipes up in the background. "Second favourite."

For a moment, I am dumbfounded. "You CAN'T be serious."

"What?" David says, looking confused.

"What's going on there?" my Mom asks on the other end of the phone.

"Sean Connery is your SECOND favourite?!?" I start to stand.

"What's happening?" Mom asks.

"NO! Your Mom's! It's your Dad and then Sean Connery!" David is literally backing away from me.

"Oh, thank God," I say, sitting back down. "I thought you meant that he was YOUR second favourite Bond. That you were going to say some shit about Roger Moore being first, and then I was going to have to punch you in the throat."

"Wow. You are next level with your Connery devotion."

"Heather? Heather?" My Mom is a bit frantic on the phone.

"Sorry Mom." I then catch her up on my David's theory of favourites. 

"Well," she laughs. "He is definitely up there for me."

"This could have been an enormous, terrible, marital revelation for me. I mean, we all know that it goes Sean Connery, Daniel Craig, then the pretty-much-interchangeable Brosnan/Dalton, George Lazenby for giving Bond any sort of emotional grounding and then Roger Moore for camp."

"You'll get no argument from me," says David, hands in the air.  

***

To ignore Connery's incredible acting talent outside of the Bond franchise would be near-heresy. I haven't seen all his movies, but among my favourites are: amateur psychotherapist Mark Rutlege from Marnie, train robber Edward Pierce in The First Great Train Robbery (he did all his own stunts - it's un-fucking-believable!), space Marshal William T. O'Niel from Outland, monk William of Baskerville who gives Umberto Echo's The Name of the Rose incredible heart, immortal warrior Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez from Highlander, his Oscar-winning portrayal of Chicago cop Jim Malone from The Untouchables, crotchety senior archaeologist Henry Jones Sr. in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Russian submarine Captain Marko Ramius (still with the Scottish accent) from The Hunt for Red October and ex-MI-6 agent John Patrick Mason in The Rock. 

Now I'm going to watch all those again and discover some more of his best. You should too.

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/sean_connery

***

After writing this post - it was brought to my attention that Sean Connery made some statements in Playboy in 1965 and then again in a 1987 Barbara Walters interview (defending the original Playboy statement) about how slapping women was sometimes warranted. 

https://www.newsweek.com/amid-tributes-sean-connerys-views-slapping-women-have-been-largely-overlooked-1543819

I really hate when someone I've respected has done shit like this. Yeah, he was born in 1930, yeah, he was a product of his generation with all its attending thoughts about how women could/should be treated, but outside of consensual kink, slapping women isn't and hasn't been a good thing to do for a LONG time. And yeah, in 2006, he recanted his statement, but then said that the original quote in Playboy had been taken out of context. This is not a man who took ownership of a belief that was wrong nor did he admit to the error of his ways. 

I think I broke him

"Have you ever wanted to buy me a special outfit?" I ask David.

"Pardon?" David asks, turning his head towards mine.

We're in bed, reading. He has a puzzle book and a pencil. He's writing in the margins. I'm reading a contemporary romance.

"Like, have you ever wanted to choose something specific for me to wear?"

 "Choose?" His eyebrows are frowning.

"Doesn't have to be clothes. Like a pair of sexy shoes. Or boots! You like boots." I smile and waggle my eyebrows at him. "I'm a size 9."

"No."

"Are you okay? You've gone a little pale."

"What? No, I'm good, I'm good."

"I mean, like if you found a pair of boots that Kalinda Sharma* would wear - would you be, 'I think you'd look good in these...'?" 

"Ummmm..." 

"Or, if you had a favourite outfit of mine that you'd like me to wear, you know, that you really LIKE?"

"NO!" He now looks like he might throw up a little.

"David?"

"Uhhhhh..." If I were interrogating him in a SPEC OPS unit, he would look more comfortable than he does now.

"Hey," I say, now fully turned towards him. "What's going on?"

"The... uh... the thought of me buying you something to wear, that you may or may not like, or picking out a dress for you? It really stresses me out."

"But if it's something that YOU'D like me in? It wouldn't really matter if it wasn't my favourite, if YOU liked how it looked on me. Haven't you ever seen something that you might want me to wear?"

He seems like he might be in a fugue state.

"David?" His eyes have definitely glazed over. "David??" I put my hand on his chest.

"I can barely pick out my OWN clothing!!" he explodes. "I stress over choosing SOCKS in the morning!! That's why I'm so glad when you buy me mix & match clothes so that I don't have to THINK about what I'm wearing!! CLOTHING?!?!?! Buying it, deciding about it, just for ME is STRESSFUL! Trying to choose something for YOU? I... It... I..." 

He is this close to hyperventilation.

"I just thought because I always like it when you get all dressed up. Like if you even shine your shoes for me..."

"Yeah, but you BOUGHT those shoes for me!! I didn't CHOOSE those shoes!!"

"What if you were choosing from the dresses that I already have, or the boots I already have?"

"I trust your judgement!!"

"You don't have a favourite dress that gets you all hot and bothered when I wear it?"

"I DON'T REMEMBER A SINGLE ITEM OF CLOTHING THAT YOU OWN!!!"

"Seriously?"

"SERIOUSLY!!!"

I'm taken aback. I could tell you almost every t-shirt that David has, what his underwear looks like, his dress shirts...

He starts laughing. "Right now, I'm trying to think of your dresses, and literally in my brain is the word GREEN with a question mark beside it!"

I snort. "Seriously?'

"Yes."

"So me saying that you could buy me a sexy pair of boots, that I would actually be wearing for YOU?"

"Scares the shit out of me. I'm on the verge of a panic attack right now." He's nearly hysterical with laughter. It's contagious. Very soon we're finding it difficult to breathe and are almost wetting ourselves.

"Oh love..." I smooth the hair from his forehead. "This was supposed to be like a sexy couples' thing to think of. Not pressure. I was just reading this book when the guy, he picked out an outfit and..."

"And that? That idea? Terrifies me. You... you have great taste in clothes. You always look good. You come downstairs all dressed up and I always think you look good."

"But you, having anything to do with the choosing of that outfit?"

"Not a perk. I will build you anything you want - a deck, a closet, a backyard studio. I will set up every piece of tech in this house, but please, please, please... I am begging you, don't ask me to choose clothing for you." 

"Okay... Okay... You don't have to choose clothing for me." 

"Or shoes!!"

"Or shoes. It's okay, love. It's okay, you don't have to." I hold his face in my hands and kiss him.

"Okay?"

"It's all okay."

His breathing has settled a bit. 

I kiss him again. "I'm just going to brush my teeth."

When I come back, David is looking through my closet.

"There are dresses that have green in them." He looks like he's won the lottery.

"Yes, there are."

"I DO remember some of your dresses."

I smile.

"If you ask me to pick between three dresses, I could maybe choose one."

"Only if you want to, love. Only if you want to."

***

By the by... David is the King of Thoughtfulness. Before we married, he had all of Shakespeare's comedies, in their folio editions, bound into hard covers for me, with every other page blank so that I could make acting notes. When I lost my mind as a working new Mom, I arrived home to a house full of lit candles, a glass of wine, a warm bath and a pair of earplugs to wear that night so that I could get a good night's sleep. One Christmas, he presented me with a calendar, in which he had booked us babysitters for 3 months, so that we could have date nights. My husband thinks of making my dreams come true, pretty much constantly. Just don't ask him to choose out clothing for me. ;-)

*David loves Archie Panjabi's character Kalinda Sharma from The Good Wife - mostly he loves her boots.

You'll let me know when I'm elderly, right?

"Yes. I will," says Rissa.

"Thank you."

"You are elderly."

"Runh?"

"Ma, you're showing all the signs."

"I'm 52!"

"Do you, or do you not implement fall prevention measures?"

"Yes, but that's for the ear thing..."

"Is that a bowl of hard candies on the counter?"

"Yes..."

"How many pills do you take each day?"

"Many of those are vitamins!"

"How many are prescriptions?

"Two," I say sullenly.

"What was that?"

"TWO!! I TAKE TWO PRESCRIPTIONS!!!"

"And what else?"

"Iron pills."

"For?"

"Anemia!!"

"Do you have more than one pre-existing condition?" She raises her eyebrows at me.

"Oh for the... YES! But I only have the ear thing because of the thyroid thing!"

"What about migraines?"

"Well, if you're going to count EVERYTHING..."

"Hypoglycemia??" Another eyebrow raise.

"Shut up."

"All signs point to elderly."

"I would just like to say that when I updated my life insurance, that NONE of my conditions stopped me from getting coverage again."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously. All my issues? Unless they're heart or lungs related? They mean dick to insurers. So SUCK IT!"

"Is that an early-onset dementia mood swing??"

My delicate frickin' flower

"I'm telling you Rissa, when you're middle-aged, your vulva gets sassy."

Rissa pauses brushing her teeth. "I'm sorry?"

"Your vulva - well at least your labia - they get..."

"What is happening right now?"

"I was wearing those pants without underwear..."

"Ma!"

"I am passing on information that will be useful when YOU are 52 years old."

"About my vulva?"

"Or it might just be your labia. I'm never sure of the distinction. I mean, I know that the labia are the lip bits. Help me out here. You're the nursing student."

Rissa looks like she wants to bang her head on the vanity. "The vulva is the whole crotch area."

"Crotch is the vulva. Got it." I think for a sec. "Crulva."

"Please don't ever say THAT again."

"What? If I make a new word it will forever be clear in my mind."

"Other people's mothers don't share like this."

"But they should! Seriously. You're going to want to know that lace underwear will become the enemy in your 40s and then, when you're 52, you go commando in a pair of 95% polyester / 5% spandex/elastane wide cut pants and your... labia - really it's just the labia - will not be happy with you."

Rissa just looks at me.

"And I used to be able to wear the pretty lacy panties, but now, unless there's a cotton gusset in there with some good acreage, by the end of the day (or night - depending when I wear them) my crulval area is not pleased."

David pokes his head into the bathroom. "Crulval?"

Rissa shudders. "Please DO NOT encourage her."

"Crotch and vulva. The crotch area is the vulva," I say as I brush my teeth.

"Ahhhhhh, I see."

"I'm trying to impart my knowledge of what the female body does..."

"I don't think all female bodies do this," says Rissa.

"Oh, I think they do. You get older and your body gets overly sensitive."

"YOUR body Ma. YOUR body is WAY sensitive."

"I'm going to poll my friends."

"OH. MY. GOD."

"And then you'll know....  Wait! I am going to ask Mor Mor and I will bet you anything that she'll confirm it." 

"I can't see Mor Mor wearing lacy panties."

"Because now she CAN'T."

"Seriously?"

"I'm sure that Mor Mor would still wear lacy panties if she could. She might want to spice it up now and again..."

"ARGH!"

CUT TO: THE NEXT MORNING

"Mor? Can you still wear lacy panties?'

There is a pause on the other end of the phone. "Can I what?"

"If you wear lacy panties or non-cotton panties, do they irritate your lady bits?'

"Well... no, I don't think so."

"No?"

"I've never noticed that."

"I'm talking about a pair of LACY panties - with a very small gusset?"

David snorts from the other room.

"I can't say that it's ever been an issue for me. I mean, I don't wear a lot of lacy panties now, but I do have polyester panties and they don't seem to bother me."

"But they have a BIG cotton gusset right?"

"Well I've never measured it."

"Aw crap. She's right!"

"Who's right?"

"Rissa. She said that my lady bits are just overly sensitive."

"Well that may be the case. Your body IS sensitive. You know Heather, natural fibers are always best. These new fabrics are all well and good, because they're easy to care for, but you can't beat cotton."

"Yeah, I know. These new fabrics, they bite me in the... well, not ass, but they sure as hell irritate my labia!"

"And this is why you called?"

"Yep. Thanks. Love you." I hang up the phone.

Rissa comes down the stairs. "I told you it was just YOUR..."

"Crulva?"

She rolls her eyes. "Last night something struck me. You said you were wearing pants with no underwear."

"Yeah."

"Well don't do that! If you wear underwear you won't get irritated."

"Yes, but those pants are jersey and if I wear cotton panties with them, the pants will be all bunchy and clingy..."

"WEAR cotton thongs! They MAKE cotton thongs!"

Epiphanic. "Yes. Yes, that's perfect. I can do that. Unless my perineum is irritated."

***

Please help me get to the bottom of this.

DIY Nip/Tuck

David and Rissa say that I am not allowed to take up DIY cosmetic surgery. No matter how much I want to. I'd just like to say though, that if my armpits were made up of fabric instead of migrating breast tissue stores, I could put a dart in that shit. 

I am very handy with a needle and thread and excel at following YouTube videos. I'm pretty sure that with some hydrogen peroxide, a shop vac and fishing line I could do some good work. But "because it's flesh and blood with the possibility of infection and death," I'm not allowed to try.  After being my own successful guinea pig, I could offer my APP NT (arm pit pudge nip/tuck) to friends and family. I'd do it as a charitable service for other women of a certain age whose bodies have chosen to metamorphose without their host's permission.

Scratch that - do not try this at home. I just googled it and this was the first thing that came up:

I want to be that body-positive 52 year old with 5 decades of comfortably living in my skin. But instead of reveling, I spend an inordinate amount of time fixated on my extra breasts. I sqwoosh them. I berate them. I feel that they are a beacon to the entire world. I Google "extra weight around middle" and discover that a waist line over 35 inches for a women is a health concern. Oh, for the love of... this is no longer cosmetic! 

Fucking menopause. Its subtitle is literally THE CHANGE OF LIFE. I should know this.

My breasts have converted their now useless milk ducts into even more incredibly bodacious ta-tas?  Huzzah! If I want to stop traffic on King Street, all I've got to do is take a deep breath. Those same boobs that are no longer content to dwell upon my torso and have now snuck across the border into arm pit town?   Give me a sec...  wait... wait... I could hook up small bicycle horns so that when I play with their pulchritude I get a musical interlude!  And... a great new busking act! From which I could make money!  HAH!

Benign moles getting me down? Play connect the dots with all that new skin topography and see how many constellations I have!

To maintain my weight I now need to walk for more than an hour each day and cut more calories, but not so many calories that my body's fight or flight response is triggered?  It's all good! My heart and lungs just LOVE the extra exercise and juggling carbohydrate and caloric math is incredibly helpful to my now failing brain!

When I update my glasses prescription I want a filter so that I can see myself through my daughter's / friends' / husband's eyes. They don't see the extra boobs or the increasing waist line. They see my smile, my vintage skirts with pockets, my me-being-me.

So how about this? I shall focus on my physical health, but not to the detriment of my mental health. I'll walk more, I'll eat things that are good for me, I'll manage my stress by remembering this,

and I won't pick up a scalpel.

I'm not 20 any more.

"OHHHHHHH! OHHHHHHHH GOD!" I moan.

"Heather?"

"Sweet Jesus..."

"You okay in there?"

"I'm good, I'm good." 

David cracks open the bathroom door. "You sure?"

"I did cardio kickboxing yesterday with Rissa."

"Ahhhhhh... not that kind of moaning."

"Yeah."

He winces as I try to walk.

"It's like child birth."

"What?"

"Kickboxing. It's like child birth. I've done this class at least three other times. But somehow, in between sessions, I forget. I forget the decimation."

My mouth drops open to gather more oxygen as I attempt to move my leg. 

Since the pandemic hit, Rissa is back at home and has been doing virtual fitness classes. We've been rocking the  mother-daughter time this way. Cardio Dance, Zen Barre, HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) and Cardio Kickboxing. Rissa is 20. She's an ex-competitive-dancer. She's super fit. I... am none of those things.

Most of the classes, after the initial physical fall-out, I learn not to be a moron. I know NOT to do four sets of eight calf raises TWICE during Zen Barre (1 set with feet together and another with feet shoulder width apart). I do not even try to match the burpee count of the HIIT instructor. With kickboxing? I have selective dementia.

It's because I love kicking. I FUCKING LOVE it.

14 years ago, after a few weeks of watching Rissa and David have fun in taekwondo, I got jealous. In spite of my post-gymnast hip arthritis,  I bought a martial arts uniform and quickly became a yellow belt. Kicking night was revelatory. One of my proudest moments was when I almost kicked Sir Glen through a plate glass window. He'd been unprepared for my leg strength. I'd been unprepared for my leg strength. The fact that he had to widen his stance and engage his core whenever I was next up for push kicks? Still makes me preen.

I'd get so fucking jazzed for kicking night. Primal. Powerful. Playful. This one night, we were doing sprints to warm up across the length of the dojang. Run, run, run, run, run. STOP. Burpee. Run, run, run, run run... I was really giving it. And this, for me, was a big deal. I hate sweating in public. I hate panting in public.  I just generally hate being in a group while I exercise. But my reward was kicking the shit out of things afterward, so I would willingly suffer through the moist crotch and the lank hair during warm up.

We were nearing the end of the sprints. I ran, ran, ran, ran, ran, dropped and did a burpee and then I started running again. Problem was, I wasn't fully vertical. Rissa told me later that I looked like a cross between the Roadrunner and the Coyote. My legs pinwheeled super fast and then I propelled myself into the mat, as if I had an ACME rocket strapped to my back. I separated my left shoulder and David, who'd stayed home that night, got a phone call from Sir Glen.

"Hi David. It's Sir Glen from...."

"What did she do?"

After I finally healed, I never went back to taekwondo. But I've reminisced over it. The kicking part. The surprising people with my leg strength part. The feeling so capable and badass part. I crave that shit. It's just that now, at the age of 52, my body's not so happy when I decide once every three weeks that I want to kick. I'm in pain for three days afterward, tell myself for the next week and a half that I won't do it again, but then Rissa looks at me, raises her eyebrows and says, "Cardio Kickboxing?" and I cave.

This isn't the virus you're looking for.

So hot. Sweaty. Can't get enough air into my lungs. Climbing up through sleep knowing one thing is certain: This is it. I have COVID-19. The pit of my stomach fills with panic. I kick one leg out of the blankets, seeking cooler air. The rest of my body feels paralyzed. I have no energy - I'm wading through molasses. I fight to open my eyes. So fucking hot. My chest hurts.

"Prrrrrowl?"

My eyes open.

It's Steve. My cat Steve is on my chest. I'm also having a hot flash. It is NOT COVID-19.

Had I been truly awake I would have employed logic. I have not touched or been within 2 meters of anyone I don't live with for 6 weeks. David is the member of our family who goes out into actual public and whenever he buys groceries/pharmaceuticals he wipes off everything and religiously washes his hands.

But given the current reality you get those random thoughts.

I have a fever. Is it COVID-19?
Are you a woman in menopause? Is this a hot flash? It's NOT COVID-19.

I have shortness of breath. Is it COVID-19?
Do you have a cat on your chest? It's NOT COVID-19.

I have a dry cough. Is it COVID-19?
After you stop cleaning your house fanatically, does the cough stop? It's NOT COVID-19.

I'm achy. My joints are in pain. Is it COVID-19?
Have you been exercising more than you ever have in your entire life? It's NOT COVID-19.

I have a sore throat. It hurts when I swallow. Is it COVID-19?
Have you had any water today? Drink some water. Does it feel better? It's NOT COVID-19.

My head hurts. I have a blinding headache. Is it COVID-19?
Did you drink too much wine/whisky/scotch/vodka/tequila last night? It's NOT COVID-19.

***

As an empath, my low-grade-dealing-with-a-pandemic anxiety shifts into high gear when I'm stupid enough to read the news before bed.

"Ma? Ma - what is it?" asks Rissa as I flop down on her bed one night in tears.

"So many people are dying. Hundreds of thousands of people are dying. Nurses and doctors and respiratory therapists and PSWs who are trying to HELP the ones who are dying are dying..."

"Okay, no more news for you. Dude."

***

Nursing students have been asked to take the strain off other medical workers. Rissa now works as a PSW at a Long-Term Care facility for the summer, where, I am thankful, there have been no cases (touch wood).

"Ma? Ma what is it?"

"It's just all the people who live there. They can't socialize. They can't see their families... They can't... hug."

"Oh Ma... Stop. You can't think about it. Yes, it's sad, but you can't think about it."

"But..."

"No buts. You have too much empathy. Think of it this way. Most people, they get a regular amount of empathy flowing through their bodies. You... you got... 6 times that. You empathize with an ant when you kill it. It makes you a good actor, but it's going to make you crazy."

"Er."

"Pardon?"

"Crazi-ER."

"Yeah. That too."

***

So now? Now I don't delve, I don't check stats all the time, I try not to empathize. I... breathe. I place my feet flat on the floor to ground myself. I strike the Superhero pose just like I learned from Grey's Anatomy.  And I thank every deity out there for all the Front-Line workers who  are putting themselves at risk every single day to help us get through all of this.

THANK YOU.