Monday, January 8, 2018

The Biggest Boob

I've always had a weakness for big things: big purses, big hair, big diamonds, big sandwiches. I consider myself a connoisseur of the finer things in life, yet I also like oversized sweatpants and max-stuffed Oreos. I guess I'm a bit of a walking (or more likely sitting) contradiction. So while I can understand that my husband doesn't feel the need to shower me with lavish gifts every Christmas, I also assume that he still knows how to use that big brain of his.

I gave birth to a nine pound clone of my husband, celebrated 7 years of marriage, and turned 32 all in the span of four weeks. As each celebratory occasion came and went without so much as a foot rub, I started wondering what wondrous Christmas surprise my husband had planned for me.  Now surely you, my sensible audience, can understand that I was expecting something in the ballpark of a Mercedes Benz this holiday season. Or an island. An island would do.

Christmas morning arrived and I patiently waited for Amelia to open all her gifts so I could guiltlessly tear into mine. I had visions of shimmering diamonds and crisp airline tickets to Bora Bora; perhaps a newly discovered galaxy named after yours truly. And there it was, placed so delicately under the tree---a perfectly wrapped box with the fanciest of bows, just waiting to be opened and loved. Ladies and gentlemen, there are no words.




I introduce to you the Beebo! In case the picture isn't self-explanatory, my highly anticipated gift is a hot pink rubber tit that holds a bottle of milk. I assume it comes hands-free so one can conveniently smack their husband upside the head for buying the Beebo in the first place. Really, Matthew? You saw this and thought of me? Were you thinking of gift ideas one night and this just came to you in a vision, like, "I think my high maintenance wife would love to dangle this atrocity from her shoulder! Surely it would improve her quality of life if she didn't have to hold a bottle with her actual hand!"

Fast forward two weeks and that stupid rubber hooter is still sitting in its box, taunting me. I load Millie into the car and head to Springfield to meet my friends and their children at Skyzone Trampoline Park, and Matt stays home with Greta and the Beebo. It's been about, oh, say two years, give or take, since I've really broken a good sweat, but I figure now, seven weeks postpartum, is as good a time as any. I'm feeling limber and spry as I glance upon the ten foot basketball hoop at the end of the trampoline. I say to myself, "Surely after that McDonald's lunch and with this extra thirty pounds of baby weight I'm carrying, I can slam dunk the hell out of this basketball!"

Nope. No, I couldn't.




I got about three feet of air, threw the ball wildly at the net, and heard an ominous "pop" that I can only compare to the opening of a Pringles' can. Holding my ankle in the fetal position, I rolled around the trampoline while a group of bored kids stared at me, impatiently waiting their turn.

I'm back home limping, terrified to go to the hospital for an X-ray because patients with influenza A (this year's dominating strain) are surely gathered by the hundreds there. Then, like some sort of sick joke, Amelia has a snow day. So here I am, watching my six-year-old screech out an Alicia Keyes' tune because I don't have the heart to tell Amelia that her singing parallels my slam-dunking abilities, all the while trying to alternate ice and heat on my Shrek foot and feed the baby. Ugh, if only I had an extra hand!

Oh.You.Have.Got.To.Be.Kidding.Me.

That damn Beebo is now strapped on my chest. If my foot weren't so swollen, I'd be putting it in my mouth.