Shit Happens - The Middle Aged Siren

Shit Happens – The Middle Aged Siren

I am in my mid-forties and marching towards fifty.  I’m horrified by the changes in my body, no matter how hard I work at holding it all together, and concede that I am definitely losing my fight with gravity.  A far cry from the narcissist, I scream in fright if I walk past a mirror and catch a glimpse of my naked form.  I am in awe and more than a little envious of the women my age who can look in the mirror and just accept the reflection.  I am constantly shocked and surprised that it just continues to deteriorate at frightening speed.

Curves

Never accepting the label ‘curvaceous’, I have fought hard to change those curves over the years but to no avail.  Even when I have lost a decent amount of weight at one stage or another, it was still the same me running around with all of those lumps and curves, I was just a little harder to find.  And when I finally did get down to my desired weight (this has only happened on a couple of occasions), I had eaten nothing but lettuce leaves dipped in vinegar and would look longingly at a glass of wine with an unhealthy desire.  Then I got sick – my immune system shot to the shitter, taking my resolve along with it. 

Torture Classes

Spin Class:  The first spin class at the absurd hour of 6am did little to improve my body shape but it did teach me some valuable lessons in understanding the workings of an exercise bike.  Thou shalt not suddenly cease pedaling.  The very first attempt at this class had me thrown face first over the handle bars of the bike, almost tearing my mons pubis off in the process.  Face flaming, not so much from exertion as embarrassment, I caught myself just before hitting the floor and awkwardly hauled myself back over the handle bars to my seat.  The instructor asked if I was alright, drawing the attention of every person in that sweaty spin class and making me blush scarlet.  All I wanted to do was climb off the stupid contraption and go home and back to bed to start the day again. Shit!

Boot Camp: Then there were the boot camp classes that found me at 5.30am doing push-ups, burpies and commando crawling on an oval shimmering white with frost.  It was as cold as a witch’s tit out there in the dead of winter and here I was romping around in it, all in an effort to tighten my booty.  Running with 10kg weights in my hands didn’t do the ‘Boxercise’ induced shoulder injury much good either but by the time I got fed up with it, my arse was so tight and so high that I was just about getting my hair caught in the crack and getting shit stains on my collar.  Then the trainer turned out to be a fuckwit and I had to leave before I separated him from his testicles. Dick!

Gym: Back to the gym I went, continuing to do the same shit, peppering it with weights and hating every Godamned second of it.  I wasn’t losing weight and shrinking, I was turning into butch Hercules!   Getting up at the crack of a sparrow’s fart lasted for about seven consecutive years before I threw it all into the too hard basket and opted out of gym memberships.  Walking would have to suffice and I would walk at a decent time of day too.  Enough!

Pole Dancing: I seriously contemplated taking up pole dancing.  I had heard amazing things about what it does for your body.  Further investigation revealed that I would be required to turn up to these classes in high heels and hot pants.  Imagining my hail damaged fat arse squeezed into tight little hot pants with my thunder thighs squished out the bottom made me laugh so hard it resulted in an asthma attack.   Then I imagined hauling this fat arse up a pole and trying to slide down, my thighs gripping the pole; vibrating & shaking all the way down and tearing myself a new one in the process.  Or worst still, hanging upside down seductively then losing my grip and landing on my head.  I have the grace and aplomb of a baby hippopotamus on ice skates and couldn’t imagine putting myself through the class without actually dying of embarrassment.  Nope

Gravity

Boobs: Everything is heading south at an alarming rate.  My breast tissue has lost all elasticity and I have to pour them into my bra where they look amazing until I come home and rip the annoying restraint off and sling-shot it across the room, letting the prisoners run free.  There is almost an audible ‘slap’ as they flop against my body, swinging pendulously.  My raging hormones are making the bloody things get larger which is making the whole gravity issue fast forward at a rate that’s off the radar.  The last time I walked into a lingerie shop to purchase a new sports bra (I had been doing some floor exercises and as I lifted my pelvis off the floor, one of my tits hit me in the chin and almost made it to my mouth – time for a new bra), the attendant took the DDs I had taken into the cubicle with me and said “I think you’re an E cup now”.   “The Hell I am!” I bellowed at her, my face thunderous in my denial.  She patted my shoulder and condescendingly said “it happens to the best of us, we just have to accept our changing bodies”.  She was, like, twenty two years old and a B cup, if that.  Fuck off with your sage advice, bitch - surviving puberty does not equate to a mutual hormonal experience.  I marched right out of that store and went to another where I was given the same advice, but coming from a woman in her fifties in the throes of a hot flush, it wasn’t such a bitter pill to swallow.  I am not looking forward to menopause – the very thought scares the shit out of me. Aarrgghh!

Bum: My arse, despite my best efforts, is starting to droop and I can see it sagging in the back of my knickers.  Even my sexiest lingerie now looks like a sack of shit on me.  I’ve lost all interest in trying to look sexy.  At my age, I just want to be comfortable and not have four boobs or have my knickers disappear up my arse.  The backs of all my bras are at least eight centimeters wide and my knickers have to have a wide boat arse in them.  None of that ‘cheeky’ cut knickers business – they just go straight up my arse and feel like I’m wearing a thong and I am opposed to wearing bum floss.  I don’t relish spending the whole day with my fingers up my arse digging them back out again.  The Captain once asked why I have to wear bras with such horribly large and unsexy backs on them.  He doesn’t understand the gravity thing.  He bought me lingerie once and it was a total fail.  It had a one centimeter thin strap across the back, which spent most of its time up the back of my neck caught in my hair with the weight of my tits, and thin spaghetti straps which dug into my shoulders painfully.  The knickers were the kind that would look gorgeous on a Victoria’s Secret model but which made me look like an ethnic Michelin Man with a tan.   Unsexy has become my bedroom attire.  We've been doing this for a very long time husband, I'm a sure thing!  I have actually started wearing a thin cotton thing, which I bought in Thailand to throw over bathers, to bed and it looks alarmingly like a ninety year old woman’s nighty.  As unsexy as it is, it is hella comfortable!  Passion Killer.

Wrinkles

Laugh lines my arse – my face looks OLD!  Where did these crow’s feet come from?  I could give Crocodile Dundee a run for his money with this face.  I recently had my ten year Driver’s License photo taken and was horrified to see that my whole face has dropped.  What the fuck happened?  Ten years ago I had a small tight triangular face, now I’ve got a giant misshapen rectangle.  I’ve got jowls… JOWLS!!! If I dare to look down, I’ve got about 25 chins and did I mention that I’ve got JOWLS!  I flex my hand and the veins stand up on the backs of my hands like giant worms under my skin; I twist my wrist and the skin on my forearm wrinkles and Chinese burns itself, I smile and I my eyes crinkle; I frown and my forehead furrows; I look concerned and I get a second vagina between my eyebrows; I get up in the morning and there is a giant crease between my tits which goes all the way up to my throat… it’s still there at 10am; I squeeze my arse and get…. just dimples – it doesn’t wrinkle because THE SKIN IS STRETCHED TIGHT OVER ITS AMPLE FORM!

Younger Me

When I was in my twenties, I assumed you bought a plot of land when you reached forty as you were destined to meet your maker in a few short years.  Now that I’m here, I would dearly love to go back in time and shake the living shit out of that stupid twenty year old idiot.  I would tell her to stop smoking because she will regret the cat’s arse her mouth becomes in the future; I would tell her to stop hating on her body because even though she’s not a stick insect, she is lean, firm, young, fit and strong.  I would tell her to embrace her large Latino arse because in the future, huge horse arses would be highly sought after and one celebrity, who had hers augmented to look like Pharlap’s booty, would take photos of her oiled up giant arse and break the internet and another would write a song stating that anaconda’s really like butts of an equine likeness; I would tell her to enjoy her C cup bras as she’s going to reach udder status in her later years; I would tell her to wear all the beautiful sexy lingerie she can now because she’s going to look like a Shetland pony in the future and lose all desire to wear it because it hurts and looks really shit; and I would tell her to learn to love herself now so she wouldn’t be so hard on herself in the future when it really counted…when gravity and age ravage it and make it look ick.  Turn all the lights out!

 Doona

Shit Happens - Stupid Annoying Spiders

Today is Friday 13^th.  Today the spawn of Satan flew through my window and landed on my lap with a plop.  A big, fat, juicy, hairy eight legged fiend.  Today I was reminded that I really don’t like spiders.  I have had therapy for my spider phobia and I really thought I had combatted the worst of it.  I even became fascinated by them and their amazing abilities but with Funnel Web spiders constantly inhabiting the windows in my bedroom and ‘quick as lightening’ White Tail spiders falling off the light fittings in the kitchen onto my head, I feel that my phobia has come full circle again. 

Not a great start to Friday 13^th.  I’m not usually superstitious but come on!  I was driving to work and decided to wind the window down to feel a little summer breeze on my face and in my hair.  The temperature was a pleasant 20°C, on its way up to a top of 34°C.  I pulled up at the lights and was patiently waiting for them to change when out of the corner of my eye I spied movement…something large by the look of it.  Then the mother of all Huntsman spiders plopped onto my lap and I completely flipped out.  Instead of screaming like a normal human, I took my hands off the wheel and flapped about, making squeaky  “ Eeeeeeeek!” noises like a complete girl.  This HUGE fucker was just sitting there, enjoying the comfort of my lap.  I involuntarily started pushing my feet on the floor & brake pedal so hard that I was almost planking in the front seat.  Spooked by the hardening of my thighs, the spider crawled up my lap, over my stomach and over my arm at great speed.  Still sitting at the lights, I had a completely spastic fit and during the fit, the spider flicked up under the rain guard over my side window, shooting webs all over my arm and the side of my face.  My ‘Eeeeeeeh” was starting to sound like the wail of a siren to my own ears.  I didn’t want Mr Spider to die – I just wanted him outside of my car and away from me.  Hands shaking, I very slowly (didn’t want to spook the fucker again) moved my hand to the automatic window winder button … and I wound the window up.  The window went up with the speed of a sloth and the spider started to back up, but not quickly enough and three of its legs got caught in the window.   The spider sat there for a moment and then it started having its own fit.  This was like being in some horror movie, my horrified expression certainly resembled ‘Ghostface’  – it was so close to my face and my brain would not acknowledge the glass between us.  I was now squealing like a stuck pig inside my car and shaking violently like a Chihuahua with pneumonia.  To my horror, it then tore off its own legs (probably got frightened by my hideous face screaming at it in the window) and amazingly, I apologised to it in the same squealing voice I had used to scream at it.  I had gone completely mental!   Anyone looking at my car from the outside would have thought I was perhaps having exciting sex in it, such was the bouncing movement and squeals coming from within.  Unfortunately, I was alone and not enjoying the moment.  The lights turned green and I reluctantly drove on.  Spidey learned to fly.

Only a couple of months ago, I was cleaning the windows in my bedroom when I spied the tell-tale signs of a funnel web in the corner of my double hung sash window.  I rattled the window a little and out came the long, shiny front legs.  Eeeeek!  I ran for sixteen year old Miss Marvellous, who fears NOTHING, and asked her to come with me whilst I killed it.  This doesn’t sit well with her as she’d rather we didn’t kill it – but I was adamant.  So the window I had just cleaned was now white with a film of spray; the web decorated with white drops when out climbs a four centimetre evil looking, shiny maker of nightmares and just walks around like I hadn’t drowned it in spray.  These hardy bastards are hard to kill and take way too long to even LOOK affected by the spray.  I emptied another half a can on it for good measure, muttering to myself about my desire to nuke the fucker.  Then it stretches all of its legs so it almost doubles in length and I start backing out of the room, my hands wrapped around my daughter’s arm.  Miss Marvellous gives me ‘are you serious’ face, glares down at my hands strangling her upper arm and back at my face.   “Really?  And you’re how old?”  Fuck off, I’m freaking out!  The spider started walking in jerking movements and then fell off the window sill and plopped onto the floor.  I was torn between wanting to jump into my daughter’s arms and climb on top of her head to safety.  I then said “Ooh, it’s dying.  I’m sorry spidey” and she looked at me like I was completely bipolar.  It took about fifteen minutes to die and about two hours for the Heebee Jeebees to leave my body.  I still made Miss Marvellous scoop it up and put it in the bin – just in case it was pretending  to be dead. We usually don’t kill spiders in our house but White Tails and Funnel Webs are the exception to the rule because I’m petrified of them; but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel remorse.

   

Another memorable occasion prior to that was about six years ago and long before the renovation.  I was standing at the kitchen bench when I felt something drop onto my head.   I put my hand up, expecting to feel a drop of water but something moved.  So of course I started break dancing and stutter rapping all over the kitchen until the spider ran down my face and onto the bench.  Seeing it was a White Tail, I yipped like a kicked puppy and ran out of the room, arms flailing above my head like ET, to see the startled look on Boy Wonder’s face.  Yes, Mother has completely lost her marbles!  He asked what was wrong and I replied that I saw something scary.  Then the fucking terrorist crawled up over the bench and dropped onto the floor and started running as fast as its eight legs could carry it across the floor.  I leapt onto my son’s lap and told him to pull his feet up.  He looked at me like I has just stepped off a space ship.  To be truthful, I would rather have been surrounded by aliens probing every orifice with all manner of instruments than dealing with this little beastie on my living room floor.  Finally deciding to be an adult about it, I went into the kitchen, giving the little fiend a wide berth, and came back with a can of Mortein.  I sprayed the little creature, running after it with the spray, leaving a trail of white across my floor.  I then went to join my son on the couch until it had shrivelled sufficiently for me to relax.  Unfortunately, on my way back to the couch, I slipped over in the meters of slippery spray on the floor and landed like with a “Kurumph”;  the sound startlingly reminiscent of thunder, my face inches from the irate spider who had reared up and was in attack position.  I must have teleported into the kitchen because I don’t remember getting there, I just materialised before the sink.  Like the mature adult that I am, I climbed up onto the kitchen bench and sat rocking against the splashback, trying to calm my frazzled nerves.  My son was warily watching me, mirth crimping his eyes.  Little shit.  Well I am glad I can provide entertainment for my children, if nothing else.

Today’s little visitor in the car has left me with the stiffness of a pulled muscle in the shoulder and every other muscle in my body quivering like I’ve just left an aerobics tournament.   I keep shaking and shuddering all over and just a moment ago, a hair fell out of my head onto my foot and I almost performed a backflip in the office – my spidey senses are tingling.  Shudder - spiders shit me!