Excuse Me... I've Got a WEDDING to Squeeze Into

First of all, I want you to know that the subject of today’s post was not of my doing.  Several bloggers and actual human beings started this conversation days ago. 

The subject is bodily appendages that must be decorated for special occasions. I think everyone is caught up, of course, that our oldest son Nick is getting married in a week, so ‘tis the season to decorate our appendages! 

My next-door-neighbor, Sue, for example, just visited me sporting a new hole in her nose with a precious gem inside it! 

Coincidentally, seconds before her visit, I had been on Darcy Perdue’s blog, 'So Then,' where she was discussing her husband's Father’s Day gift.  She was thinking of buying him an …  appendage sock

It was a joke gift, but what resulted was no laughing matter. It seems the appendage-sock is being marketed as Bathing Suit Apparel for men, and Darcy would like equal opportunity. So Darcy invented a sort of … breast thong.  An appendage sock for women so we may avoid pulleys, winches and flying buttress-straps in the heat of the summer.  Just wear the breast sock.  Or two.  To the beach.

She did not discuss what women might wear as beach-accoutrement on their lower half. But I gave it thought whilst shopping yesterday for wedding-relevant hosiery to adorn my legs and those of my daughter, Abigail, for her brother Nick’s wedding.

Deep within a Mouldering Hosiery Clearance Bin resided four boxes of something called The Buty-Pad:  rubberized underpants with pads on the buttock-haunch for booties needing special-occasion enhancement.  An underpant for the disabled derriere. 

Which reminded me of my friend Emily, who writes blogs such as urban mermaid and insomniac's kitchen, because Emily had just sent me a Calvin Trillin quote: “Recently. . . describing the tendency of older men’s hindquarters to flatten out, I spoke of a condition called D.T.S. — Disappearing Tush Syndrome — and mentioned that it could cause an otherwise respectable senior citizen to walk right out of his pants. So far, nobody else has mentioned D.T.S. Still, there’s time.”

Emily and I went on to discuss a variety of similar disappearances:  triceps replaced by papery arm-dangle, days before one's son gets married, from the makers of Invasion of the Buty-Snatcher.

Height disappears as well.  I learned this at my doctor's office two days ago. To be 'at my best' for Nick’s Nuptials, my physician and I agreed to find a festive beta-blocker to reduce my blood pressure and my 'special myeloma-thoughts' (the wedding is coinciding with my husband’s new anti-myeloma treatment with a JUST-approved drug that sometimes -- as in almost never -- causes cardiac death… which it has NOT, of course, caused. Meanwhile, all of this has made my blood pressure ‘festive.’) 

My blood pressure, however, pales by comparison to the number of inches-in-height I apparently no longer am.

A new computer program at my doctor's office spits out everything in hard copy from each visit, which gets presented to me by my physician, her assistant, the vital-signs nurse, facilities management staff and the booking secretary when I try to leave after giving her my co-pay.  "Wait.  Please take a copy of today's visit-data."  "But I already--"  "TAKE IT!!!"

In case I lose any of the five sets provided, they thoughtfully mail out a fresh one within 24 hours.

I have been witness to the same data-set six times in 48 hours -- so the evidence is irrefutable.  In two years I have lost one inch.  That's eleventy-two THOUSAND micrometers.

Fortunately, I have Emily to find "counter-balance" to all this vertebral and tricep shrinkage. According to Emily, there is a percentage of women who, as they enter their 60s, acquire fresh, new cleavage!

Just when my buttocks atrophy to pita-depth and spinal discs compress to the consistency of my tub’s drain flange, I can look forward to having what looks like a second ass on my chest. 

It seems to be a question of migration.

I even MET someone who discussed this phenomenon the same day that Emily did! I will call her Glinda.  Because she is a witch.  She can use needle-and-thread to make magic happen on a mother-of-the groom dress.

Glinda is the seamstress who came highly recommended by our Dry Cleaner, and if you can’t trust the folks who use toxic waste on fine silk, who can you trust to create counter-balance for atrophied parts?

In 24-48 hours, I will pick up my Mom O’Groom dress, professionally altered by Glinda. (Oh, when I was growing up, we never referred to 'neutering' or 'spaying' animals.  We had dogs 'altered' -- like my dress.)

Glinda is somewhere between 67 and 74, claims to have shrunk three inches since high school, has five cats and could star in an episode of Hoarders.  I love her.

When Glinda and I discussed how ‘we’ would ‘alter’ my dress and its breastplate and the spot where it plunges toward Cuba, I explained, “I am not a fan of cleavage.  I want the bodice to rise ABOVE anything Moses might part.”

Glinda smiled knowingly. "Honey, up top in high school -- all I wanted was a little 'more.’ I was a late bloomer.  But after I got married, I blossomed.  Then I continued to blossom – and look at me now.  Oy.”  We paused to marvel at her breasts which were, indeed, formidable. 

I decided that Glinda was just the right person to sew up my cleavage.  How could I go wrong with someone whose mother-of-groom advice included,  "And practice a lot of exhaling this week. You've got a WEDDING to squeeze into."

We're also shortening the straps to hike the bodice.  I described this in my earlier post as an anti-gravity maneuver. But as a professional seamstress, Glinda refers to this as 'precision hoisting.'  "It's gotta be perfect.  Too high, and there could be slippage... right under the built-in bra. But too low and the whole bodice droops like an abandoned dog's eyes.  The ASPCA has Sarah McLachlan for marketing, but YOU? You have a wedding!"

Therefore, Glinda shall hoist the straps and breastplate so everything rises above the masses. 

I love Glinda, her attitude toward cleavage and her house that has JUST enough space for a 'pathway' from her foyer to the dining room. I have no idea where she's going to perform the stitchery magic.  I think a secret room BEHIND the area we were in.  One even more crowded. Glinda seems to be a collector of silver tea pots, silver necklaces and prayer rugs.  Perhaps she used to be an Arabian Vampire Slayer.  Dozens of rugs were all folded neatly and stacked against a wall adjacent to the crowded table that housed my gown, now glistening with silver pins.  Probably pure silver.

Thank goodness for Glinda and her compressed stature with ample cleavage she hates.  She will help mine be appropriately decorated for this special occasion. And now if you'll excuse me, I have to practice exhaling because I have a WEDDING to squeeze into. 

Hey, thanks to the makers of The Buty-Pad and the  $*&@  Sock for helping me understand it is my duty to enhance appendages for special occasions. And Special-Occasion Thanks to Darcy Perdue for the breast-sock concept that inspired my nautical-dress hoisting.  Avast and shiver me chips ahoy...  this sleeveless dress be chilly.  Arrrrr.

<script>

  (function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){

  (i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),

  m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)

  })(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');

  ga('create', 'UA-42003016-1', 'carolyngivenwriter.blogspot.com');

  ga('send', 'pageview');

</script>