Bad Habits

Fishing

Fishing
Originally uploaded by maffiaso.

So..... Leo has a FISHING pole now. Yesterday, I thought I would go with him to the river to be that outdoorsy girlfriend type. It was a little chilly and somewhat wet due to this rain spell we've been having.

So anyway, I threw on a hoodie and this big old army coat. I thought I LOOKED outdoorsy, and really, the outfit made me feel like that nature chick.

We got to the river. We crossed a bridge. We slid down a few rocks and frolicked on the river bank. Leo was casting off and I was admiring the little whirlpools in the ugly brown water, when all of a sudden I glanced at my arm and AHHHHH........A CATERPILLAR. "LEO!!!! OH MY GOD!!!! GET IT OFF!! GET IT OFF!!!" Of course, while I was yelping all that, I had flung it off. Then he says to me, "wait a minute. You've got a bunch of them on you," or he said something to that effect. I can't remember word for word because I have since blocked it out of my memory. Anyway, off went the coat in a flurry. It wasn't over. I turned around and Leo found one on my hood. So that came off too. I spent the rest of my time there frantically scanning my entire body and all the pockets of the coat.

I wonder why they flocked to me? They were tent caterpillars and I'm thinking it was the damned army coat. They thought I was a tree. Sigh. That's what I get for trying to fit in. Next time, if there is one, I think I'll wear pink. Bright pink. Very UNnatural.

So am I nature girl? I don't know. I enjoy good scenery....as long as the scenery isn't crawling on me. And I can do without watching my guy pinch an earthworm in half with his thumbnail, and then wipe the slime onto his jeans. As fascinating as it is to me that men do that without batting a lash, it IS a little squeemish.

Hormones

Hormones
Originally uploaded by maffiaso.

What can I say about hormones? A woman's body is twisted and complex. 10 days before I start to bleed, my whole body bloats out (worse than it naturally is), my appetite increases, my memory fails me (worse than it usually does), fatigue hits me like a brick, and my whole body at one point or another, becomes achy: joints, muscles, bones, internal organs-you name it, I feel it. I walk around like a zombie for one half of the day and like a shitty bitch for the other.

Yet, a woman's work is never done. Sigh. No matter how tired, cranky and sucky I feel, there are always dishes to be done. Not that I always DO those dishes, but nevertheless, I'm THINKING about them, and the thought of the sink full of grime coupled with the mental image of me getting off my lazy ass to SCRUB them, is always worse than actually DOING it!

I know the men in our lives (hello Leo) will never truly understand what we go through because their hormones are one big month long straight line. And because to say to a man, "you will never be able to understand how painful childbirth is," is still more comprehensible to them than saying "you'll never understand what my menstrual cycle puts me through." Because for a guy to picture childbirth, he can just remember his last std exam and times it by a hundred. Or he can remember that video he watched in 10th grade biology, of the 1980's clad woman with her hair done and her makeup on, moaning "aaah, aaah" and he can say, "yeah. That must suck." But a man can never look at a video of the inside of a woman pmsing or imagine his hormones going in any other direction than horizontal.

So we'll just keep suffering through it, and they'll just keep underestimating it, and we will hope that in the afterlife at least, God will give them a little tast of our medicine first hand, because they definitely get a taste of it second hand here on earth!

Cynthia

Cynthia
Originally uploaded by maffiaso.