By Sandra Topp
How often do you lose thing these days? Do you walk into a room and say, “What did I come in here to get”? Frustrating isn’t it? Doctors, dentists, and sundry appointments are so frequently forgotten, the IT world of today sends you a reminder SMS or email, have you noticed?
Some years ago my golfing buddy Jenny had bilateral mastectomies. She bit the bullet and accepted what had to be done, saying no to the perky boobs the reconstruction surgeon offered. Tattooed nipples and all.
One morning over a coffee and a chat, Jenny talked to me about her two external prostheses. “I liked the new look,” she said, “but ‘hot ‘n’ heavy’ isn’t what it used to be! I was walking in my front door, and before I had even kicked the shoes off, I was flinging the boobs off”, and we both had a good laugh. But to Jen it was no laughing matter.
I now get back to the topic – “Losing things”.
Jen told me she was always losing her ‘boobs‘.
“They would turn up in any part of the house, wherever I got the urge to fling them off,” she said. “I had to show them to the grandkids, Pam, in case they sat on them, or found them kicked under the settee when they were playing hide and seek. I didn’t want them to get a fright.”
I just sat there smiling and nodding my head, Jenny has a way with words, I knew of old. “You know Kane, she went on, “he was only four years old then, and was always asking me to show his friends, when they visited with him. I had to refuse didn’t I?” she laughed. “Could you imagine little Johnny going home and telling his Mummy, ‘Kane’s Grandma showed me her boobies!’ “
” ‘Go on, Grandma,’ Kane would persist”, she said, ” ‘they are really cool.’ “
“You’re the only one who thinks so, mate,” she had muttered in reply.
“He also would strut in the door on a hot day, take one look at me and say, ‘too hot for boobies today Grandma’? Belying the fact that Max regularly attempts to console me by saying, ‘No one notices if you haven’t got boobs, Jen.’ Well, how come a four year old does! I would snap back.”
*
“Remember that day, Pam, when you rang me and we went to play golf, my first game after my chemo finished?” Jen continued. “Yes,” I said, “we met down at my club, didn’t we?” “Yes,” Jenny replied, “I didn’t tell you I took my boobs off while I was waiting for you. Remember it was a warmish day? I hadn’t played with the new boobs on so wasn’t sure how it would be on a hot day, so I took them off. Very deftly done, as if I had been doing it for years whilst sitting in the car.”
She winked and grinned. at me. We had been friends for years, we knew each other well. I chuckled away as she went on: “I wondered where to put them, so into the glove box they went. I really enjoyed being back out on the course with you, Pam, my first game back after nearly eighteen months absence, what with the surgery and chemo. I was so excited when I got home, I replayed my game blow for blow, or stroke for stroke, to Max. I remember he was delighted I was back in the swing. ‘Back to normal again!’ he said. And I remember snapping back at him, ‘What’s “normal” after cancer?’ ”
“The next morning,” the story continued, “I had an appointment, that I hadn’t forgotten, and after searching the house, I resorted to asking Max if he had seen my boobs anywhere. He looked at me, shaking his head yet again, and said, ‘Well, what did you do yesterday’? Which, of course, was great, as I immediately remembered they were in the glove box. Too bloomin’ late, I realised I should not have blurted this out to Max, as he looked at me with less than amusement in his eyes, and said once again, ‘just what did you do yesterday Jen?’ “
I was laughing so much, she paused until I composed myself. She finally said, resignedly, “I’m sick of losing my boobs, they are strictly for formal occasions these days. Twelve years on, Pam, fair dinkum, there are more important things to find than lost boobies! Like trying to remember where you parked the car!”