‘I’d just like to say that most of us begin life suckling on a breast. If we’re lucky we end life suckling on a breast. So anybody who’s against breasts is against life itself’.
– Denny Crane
Less dull that you might imagine.
I can’t remember what I was doing exactly… but I was suddenly very aware that I was lacking that special something that needed my urgent and undivided attention. A friends of mines wife, sitting across from me, had just whipped out her boob and there was this awkward (for me at least) ten second period where the boob just hung there, exposed, while she fussed with her infant and then maybe another five seconds to get it latched.
I think it was the unexpectedness of it all that took me by surprise. And so unsure of the protocol that should be followed in this particular situation I forced myself to carry on looking straight ahead, listening intently to what she was saying and ignoring the mammary gland in my heads-up-display… all while on the inside the hamster mind was falling off its wheel and having a massive foaming apoplexy.
Apparently being exposed (in certain contexts) to a hunk of meat with a nipple on it for ten seconds is enough time to cycle through quite a range of emotions I’ve realized… from feeling quite lecherous to invoking puritan sensibilities that I didn’t know I had. And everything in between.
Once the baby was on the nipple I relaxed (unclenched my jaw) and stood my brain down from red-alert. Of course I berated myself severely post event for my lack of inner-cool. Outwardly I did okay… I think.
I’m a huge fan of breast feeding. And I often rage about the sexualization of nudity. But forty years of conditioning is hard to break. Especially when it blindsides you. That… and I felt like I was breaking this unspoken commandment that you should never find yourself staring at your friends wife’s unmentionables (at least not in a public setting).
Of course I have no idea why an errant nipple should wield the power that it does or why it can provoke us in such strange ways. I mean it shouldn’t, and it makes no sense to me. Yet, here is the undeniable evidence.
So it was a good long weekend then? Fishing, boardgames and tits? Um… yeah, I guess. I mean when viewed through a filter that I would have, once upon a time, run my experiences through to gauge the ‘goodness’ thereof. In her defense, we dated for a while. Back in the day. So maybe, in her mind, she figured, ‘he’s seen it all before anyway’.
I pretended to fish for a while. Truthfully I don’t really have the mindfulness to be able to do this with any sort of… prowess. Or perhaps stamina is the salient skillset required for fly fishing? Time on target being a critical factor (I imagine) in the success of such an endeavor.
Joey can sit for twelve hours straight playing a marathon session of Twilight Imperium1 without suffering from any maladies, real or imagined, but give him vitamin D and a fishing rod and he’ll start getting twitchy.
[1] a boardgame high on the friendship ending scale. Not as high as Through the ages. But still up there.
I think its probably that it’s the quiet that gets to me. Being alone with ones thoughts does not make the cathartic experience shortlist. It’s probably one of those things I should work on. (Although that treatise has gotten so expansive that some might deem it an insurmountable task now)
Floating in an isolation tank would be hell for me!
Winston and his rats, I decide after a moments consideration. To my shame I know I wouldn’t last long before I told you exactly which floorboards the Jews were under2. I would take a beating over introspection and internal admonishment any day.
[2] Hans Landa is burned into my mind as one of the best screen villains of all time.
Our selection of board games skewed towards the cooperative and PvP lite. Games that could be played with no rules sermon or advanced prep-work, and unlikely to cause anyone to rage-quit because your home-world just got nuked.
These are, when trapped in a cabin in the middle of nowhere with a group of your friends, important considerations. I’ve seen enough cinema to know its all cheerfulness and good natured banter one moment and then BAM! quickcut to someone running through the woods and heavy breathing.
Why poke the Furies?
Go Darke 