Are You Happy Now, Sickos?

I appear to have caught your cold.  I have a headache and am hot and stuffy.  And I still have to go to work, because I have a deadline which is killing me and if I even make it through this week with only burning my hand on the oven and getting sick I will count myself lucky, so I hope you’re recovering enough that, when my sick ass shows up, I can reinfect you.

Hugs for everyone!

I went back to the gynecologist yesterday, because I live there, in my spare time, apparently.  Her nurse and I had a long talk about the economy and how hilarious it is to hear millionaires complaining about how tough times are, and then she made fun of me because my employer makes us pay for a parking spot.  “They hired you because they need you to work there, but they then charge you for the privilege of coming to work?”

“Well, in this economy, it kind of is a privilege.  And we don’t have to pay to park.  They’ve worked a deal with the city so we can ride the bus for free.”

“Oh, so y’all have to live on the one bus line in Nashville that actually works?  Or do y’all live in some imaginary city where busses go everywhere?  You just wait.  Next they’ll be making you pay rent on your desk.”

It was funny, but ouch.

And then the doctor came in and looked inside my cooter and felt my uterus.  My oldest nephew’s mom, when she was pregnant with him, said that, by the end, you have shown your vagina to so many people that, when people ask when you’re due, you just about want to throw your legs open, hand them a flashlight and tell them to go ahead and see for theselves.  Whew, she’s a pain in the ass, but I still get a kick out of her.

Anyway, yesterday, I kind of felt like I knew what she meant.  The doctor is doing her thing and I’m all talking economy and walking the dog with her nurse.

When I was young, the thought of going to the gynecologist was terrifying.  And I had all these questions my friends and I devoted a lot of time talking about but I certainly never asked my mom.  So, even though you should go once you start menstruating, I flatly refused because I believed that going to the gynecologist would make me not a virgin and, at the time, I wanted to save my virginity as a gift for my husband.

And I just want to reiterate that these were not wacko beliefs that my parents foisted on me, in the least.  They never mentioned anything about “saving yourself for marriage” or “giving your virginity to your husband” or “letting something inside your vagina ruins you” because they clearly thought such stuff was bullshit.  Don’t get me wrong, I think they would have loved for all of their children to remain virgins until we got married, but it was just a preference they had, not a moral imperative.

No, I got these ideas because my parents didn’t say anything–because it wasn’t at all an issue for them–and I was a precocious kid.  So, armed with the knowledge that we were Christian and that my dad was a minister and that I was a good girl, I set out to learn what that meant about sexuality.  And came to believe that a.) I didn’t need to go to the gynecologist because I wasn’t having sex and b.) I should not go, because it would mean I wasn’t a virgin any more and then what reason would I have for not having sex?  And I was terrified that it would hurt and had the idea that that pain would be so intense and particular that it would ruin me.

I don’t know.  Sometimes I get really annoyed at the ignorance I had over my own body, how much I bought into this idea that my whole cooter (vulva, clit, vagina, the whole nine yards) was some mysterious thing that was beyond my understanding, that it might do things and behave in ways that I could not know and would not be prepared for, dangerous music included.

Instead of being just another body part that does what it does and sometimes goes wonky and doesn’t ruin you if anyone else touches it.

Ha, it seemed like this post should have a point, but it really doesn’t.