MENOPAUSE MADE ME DO IT. It’s my new favorite shield phrase, though I do find that from behind its protection come some of the more surprising things I’ve said in my lifetime. These phrases just seem to hurtle from me, and while I must admit that they feel so good as they tumble out, even I am sometimes surprised when I hear them go whizzing by. Consider, for instance, what I recently screamed out my car window about my boobs.
There we were, having a perfectly lovely drive in the country. Just my husband and me, zipping along, talking, a rare time alone. No one was over-caffeinated, everyone was sober. In fact, I remember quite clearly that it was a rather lazy afternoon all around. Relaxed, and with no deadlines, we were simply going to our favorite bicycle store to see what was new.
I mean I’d like to blame it on the caffeine—but I can’t—and I don’t drink, so it’s not that influence that propelled me to say what I did when yet another car zipped by with one of those oval stickers on the bumper portraying merely a number.
Have you wondered what they mean? I have. Those little oval stickers used to mean only that someone had touristed in some European city, perhaps even purchased there the vehicle they are now driving and proudly want to display that. Then those little oval stick-ons started to mean more (or less) than that, and I got confused.
The sticker on the car next to us read “70.3.” Nothing more.
And as it whizzed into view I gave no time to the fairly sane man whose job in life it has become to put his index finger in the back of the neckline of my shirt and reel me in. Instead, before I asked what the sticker could possibly mean, I merely stuck my head out the window and yelled, “38 Double D!”
You know that feeling? Like you’ve passed a clot, or dodged a bullet, or otherwise just cleared the air of something you’ve long wanted to do? Maybe cats feel this way after the hurling of a hairball. I hope so. I felt good. Real good. Like I had the last time I went on a bra rant. That good.
My husband was silent for a moment; the look on his face the one he gets when he is forced to quickly shove together the evidence before him into some narrative he can live with. He looked at the bumper sticker. He looked at me. And then he began to laugh in that way I have come to value as the ultimate paycheck of my life. If marriage is the hardest room to work in Vegas—and it is—at that moment all the slots were pouring out in my bucket as he laughed and laughed and laughed.
When he was finally able again to speak, he asked calmly, “You don’t know what those are, do you?”
“Nope.”
“Triathalons. Iron Man competitions. Those are the distances the people have gone.”
“Huh.”
Now I know.
No related posts.
First time here? Here's the idea: 
{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
LOL Is it a redhead thing? I’ve been known to shout/exclaim without thinking…
My coworkers has a 26.2 sticker on her door. I googled it when she put it there…not wanting to ask and look ignorant. Marathon apparently. Good for her!
O.M.G. Margaret told me this was the funniest thing you’ve ever written, and the tea I just spit out all over my keyboard is the evidence. Keep ‘em coming, sister Marion. We all need these explosive, unbridled moments–yours and our own.
Yes, I’m wiping off my laptop screen too. So funny. Shout it with pride, sister!
Ah, you guys–Renovation Therapy, Sister Paige and Keith–thanks so much. Right after the issue of not being able to stop what I say is this little issue of not being able to stop myself from typing it either. Enjoy.
I have made it a policy of mine to eschew talking with men about (pardon the upcoming pun) menopause. I figure like so many other things in life, they’d be unable to relate and wouldn’t want to know about it anyway. Then one Sunday evening in late August, as my church was starting up their 6:30pm college Mass (they don’t have it in the summer) inside the church was so blazingly hot I’m surprised my glasses didn’t fog. Then again, maybe they did…I noticed no one else seemed overtaken by the heat but me.
The next week, when I had to email my friend the priest about something at Mass, I suggested I bring a bucket of ice so I could just plunge my head into it–like some weird flamingo–when I started to heat up.
His reply: “No problem. Don’t forget the bucket.”
For the next three years it was my throwaway line when I’d email MFTP to find out the start date of mass. And it was never more than that–not a running joke about hot flashes, not a group snicker, nothing more than acknowledgment some of us need the room a little cooler than some others; particularly if we make the effort to come to Mass even though our thermostats are broken…
I have to hand it to priests in this regard, at least the ones I know. If they don’t understand why I’m peeling off sweaters and stuff at one moment and piling them on the next, they just act like nothing’s unusual. Maybe it’s all the vestments they wear over their clothes every Sunday at services. An hour Mass in an uncooled church on a summer Sunday teaches you plenty of temperature empathy.
Nice number, I must say… a bit jealous over here!
Here’s a thought: Start a line of oval stickers with that specialized info.
I’d buy a bunch of 36Bs and start my own tagging campaign…
xoxox
thank you for a much-needed middle-of-the-night smile
Hey, Joely. So glad to give you a middle-of-the-night smile. I love the idea of the bra size stickers. Funny, wonderful. I’ll take it to the TSP commerce department.
Hiya, DJ. BYOB does mean “bring your own bucket,” doesn’t it? I love this. Thanks for sharing in the glee, sister. And stay cool.
I keep thinking: “What should I say in reaction to this?” Almost called my brother-in-law to confer. I suppose as long as you are not flashing anything out the car window, we are still within the limits of local law, but hmmm….
Reminds me of a habit I used to have: When I wanted a treat, like chips or cookies (graham crackers were my favorite always), I’d drive to town, buy the package, and en route home toss all the amount I didn’t want to eat out the car window (not the packaging, just the food part, which I am sure animals were happy about).
Then I’d go home with just a little bit left, no giant temptation. Nuts, huh? But then *you* are shouting details about what used to be called “unmentionables” by our grandmother out the window, so I guess we are pot and kettle, we are.
This is wonderful. In fact it validates some of the things I do. Just yesterday, after running down the track ramp trying to catch a train that had really already left but was caught in traffic, my best friend (truly a sister) and I caught up with it. The conductor said hurry hurry. My friend jumped on and then the train started to jolt forward, I jumped on and the train lurched forward. I slammed the conductor into the wall and yelled out. “OMG Honey, where have you been all my life.” I guess sorry would have been sufficient.
Marion,
I’m so proud of you. Yelling boob-holder size without abandon. It takes a real woman to do that. Also, proud of your husband for linking the whole thing together. You’ve obviously been together long enough for him to fit the strange puzzle together.
Hey, Margaret. Oooh, I love that. Secrets of the sisterhood and all that. Interesting. Oy Freud, as we say in family therapy. Oy Freud, indeed, both of us tossing our own version of tidbits out our windows. Thanks for sharing that. I love it.
Marti, this is divine. It’s marvelous. These things do just shoot out, yes? I mean it’s as if we lost our gasket or something. I know I did. Thank you. This will live with me forvere and ever, and every time I ride Amtrak I’ll wonder if he’s the one.
Hi, April. Thanks for being proud of us. How kind of you to say. My husband says it’s never boring here and I take that to be a great compliment. Please come back again soon for more.
Truly funny, sweet snapshot of affection and infomational to boot. Would make a great superbowl commercial selling practically anything. Right on, sister Marion!
What a hoot – high fives for a husband who so gets you and appreciates your sense of humor.
I can’t blame it on the “pause” (and why pause, really, does this mean I have to start having periods again after I die or WHAT because I didn’t sign up for that, no way)…
I will note odd looks on the faces around me and have learned to ask “did I say that out loud?” because honestly, there are times when I think I am only thinking but I am clearly thinking out loud. Oh well…. As the old saying goes, of all the things I’ve lost I miss my mind the most.
Hey, Nancy J. Thanks for the hiya and the appreciation of the affection. We are very blessed that way. Thank God he has a sense of humor. Hope to read you again soon.
Hello, Deb: And welcome back. Yes, he gets a lot of high fives, that man, and deservedly so. I kind of like this new mind, trouble though it may be. Getting others to like it, well, maybe that’s not quite the goal, but hey, it’s new, it’s mine, and it didn’t cost a thing. I look forward to seeing you again soon here at TSP.
Margaret and Marion,
I grew up in Little Neck and knew both of you, way back when. Your mom, bless her soul, was friends with my mom, Celia Cohen. I was in PS 94 with Margaret, until she skipped a grade. I remember sitting next to Margaret in 2nd Grade (Ms. Jayne, who liked to give us a long reading assignment in the afternoon and then take a nap!) and having to sit on the “girl’s side” of the double-desk, because Margaret was left-handed, and our elbows would jostle each other if we sat where we were supposed to.
I’m delighted that you two have done so well, separately and as a team, and I wish you all the best.
Steve Cohen
Welcome, Steve. How funny. As Marion will tell you, I recall so little from childhood. I am not left-handed now; was I then? Hmmm… I did in fact skip a grade, and my penmanship was a constant source of teachers’ criticism, that much I know…but I don’t know why. I do recall how hard it was to learn to write, and have the penmanship notebooks to prove it. Could it be because I was supposed to be a lefty? Oh, my!
Yo, Steve. How marvelous. And what a great memory you have–and Margaret does not. Honestly, Steve, the girl remembers nothing. Nothing. So glad to have all this help. The detail about the long reading assignment followed by the nap is priceless. Thanks so much. And please come back.
What’s the accomplishment of a triathalon compared to the never-ending quest to find a bra that fits? I’ll match those runners step for step because I have walked a million miles from Littlest Angel to 40 DD and I want everyone to know it. Next intersection I get to I am doing a shout out for the big bra wearing Victoria Secrets rejects that suffer (not so silently, apparently.) I hope I can count on you, Marion, for bail. I plan to leave my husband out of this as he is more jittery than he used to be about my spotaneous erruptions in supermarkets and durng those errie silences that sometimes happen at loud concerts. Also, I have the new vocab word of the week: pouch – as in pouch out. I never knew what to call these smaller twin breast spilling out of my “mimimizer” (a definite misnomer) into two more A cup breasts located near my armpits. Oddly shaped little breasts, but certainly a full A cup of pouch. Thanks for clearing that up.
donna
Hey, Donna. Littlest Angels, indeed. What great euphemisms we have for what bras are supposed to be. Shout it out, sister. And keep writing to us. We love it.
Hilarity. I do so enjoy musings on all things bosom and/or underwear related. And it pays off. I won $5.30 at the track by betting on a horse simply because her name was “Chesteria”. Now that’s something to shout about. Wahoooo! 38B!
Yo, Missy. And there you have it. Our boobs make us do the damndest things. I will see if Chesteria is running at Saratoga this summer, and if so, I’ll play her in a Superfecta. Wonderful. Thank you. Lovely to see you here again.
How stupendous your story – and then the comments!
“Never boring,” indeed. I salute you and Rex on your connection, your understanding of each other and, more than anything, your sense of humor. There are things, of course, I wish I’d never said, mostly in moments of pique. But who could object to hearing women we love shouting out their bra size?!
Not I.
Ah, Nick. Welcome to TSP. Thanks so much. It’s a fine man who appreciates a happy marriage story wrapped in a bra. So glad to have you here. Please come back soon for more.
This site has to be the best source of comedy there is!! I am loving every chance I have to read yet another ditty or two at a time.
I love you two girls, and celebrate the sisterhood. Never take sisterhood for granted. Is is a source of lifetime joy if you are lucky enough.
Right on Rex! I could hear his laughter in your story.
Love always,
Diane Denny ): xoxo..
PS Margaret- I too rely on others for memories of my past. According to Marion, they could represent a dangerous perspective!
PPS and the pictures are just too precious.
Hey there, Sister Diane. And welcome to TSP, where comedy can be Queen for days on end. We’re so glad you’re here, so very glad. We pledge to never take the sisterhood for granted. Thank you for the tender and welcome reminder. Keep checking on us, please, since you never know what monkey business we may get into.
How encouraging to know I’m not alone. That passage perfectly describes the relationship between myself and my husband.
Seeing as we’ve only been married two months, I hope this means we have a lot more of these moments to look forward to. The poor man has no idea what he’s in for. :)
Hey, Jes: Welcome to TSP, where husbands make great copy. You’re going to get along fine. I can feel it, sister, though do stop by again soon and let us know how it’s going. We love newlyweds. Enjoy every minute.