Boob stories

Last night I let the kids go into the "bubbly tubbly" for a treat. It's the massive one in our master bath with the jets. I squirted in some shower gel. Normally they don't like soap, but I was hoping that I'd get away with it because it was the big tub. They got in, and I went to gather sleepy suits and milk. I returned to a tsunami of bubbles. It was like the snow last week: I was scared I'd lose them in our 10x10 back yard, so I threw them in the back of the F150 pick up truck in their snowsuits. The bubbles were about 2 feet deep on top of 10 inches of water, and the texture was particularly pleasing, really dense like shaving cream. After shrieking and throwing bubbles all over each other and the bathroom for a half an hour, things got more sculptural. There were bubble hats, beards and then, of course, boobs. Seeing those big bobbing bubble boobs on my daughter's already jiggly round body was hilarious, but almost too much.

When I was little my mom sewed most of my clothes. She made these amazing little cotton bikini bottoms that tied on the sides, but she would never make me a top. I pined for a top. It almost killed me. Susie never succumbed, "You can wear a top when you have something to put in it!" and then turning to whomever was present, "I do not like to see little girls being sexualized!" Now, I could resent her for hexing me because I never ended up "having anything to put in it." But, instead, I fear I am becoming my mother. A neighbor gave me a brand new 4T Ralph Lauren string bikini the other day saying, "Isn't this so CUTE? My daughter didn't hit the size at the right season; she never wore it." As far as Susie is concerned that little number is a double whammy. A navy blue string bikini for a 4 year old with little embroidered polo players all over it. Susie never succumbed to my pleas for Izod, Esprit or Ralph Lauren either, "As soon as Mr. Lauren calls me up and wants to pay me to have my pretty daughter advertise his ridiculously expensive shirts, you can wear them." (Thank God for the Episcopalian Church fair where I procured all of the preppy shirts for $.50 each. I loved having them all worn in like a true New England preppy who'd had them in the family for years...like linen) Luckily I don't think my girl will even fit her 2T booty into those tiny bottoms, so I'm not going to have to worry about it this week, but am I going to be the only mom at the Shore not letting her girls wear tops? Christ, those little Jersey girls will be wearing gold lame stripper tops, and my poor girls will be looking like Mowgli in The Jungle Book.

I don't know anyone who isn't fascinated by boobs-certainly not in my immediate family. My son said to me the other day with an almost stoned look in his eyes, "I love your boobs, Mama." My husband asked me recently, "So what is it like?" I said, "What?" He said, "Well, you have boobs!" My daughter was cuddling with a shirtless male person (who will forever remain nameless) and his partner on a bed at the Shore last summer. She pointed to his chest and said, "Mama has boobs too." His partner misunderstood and asked, "You want food?" My daughter replied, "No, I just have nipples."

In college there was a Madonna Party. It was an excuse for all of the women to go out in lingerie, and all of the closeted gay guys got to wear leather. One of my bustier bedecked voluptuous friends said to another, "Oh my God! Can I just touch your boob?" The response was, "Sure!" It's as if the music stopped and the party went quiet, and those of us without boobs (most of them were men, I'll admit) just stared, mesmerized. I think I might have seen a few tentative hands go up inadvertently as if to say, "me too?!"

I had one busty friend ask me if I could arrange her taking my other busty friend bra shopping. "Why?" I said. The exasperated response: "Her cup runneth over; she needs to face facts; she's not a "C" anymore; she's a solid "D." She needs a Lilyette Minimizer; it's driving me crazy!"

Around the same time I had a gorgeous roommate. I was staring at her in the kitchen one morning, and I couldn't help saying, "God! you have such a nice figure!" She replied in her loud English accent, "All I can say to that Naomi Campbell is, 'I've got tits!'" A moment later she kicked her foot up and said, "and I've got a mustache too!" It was the same loud voice I heard from my dining room one evening chastising my then boyfriend, "DAN! STOP STARING AT MY TITS!"

I guess I particularly like boob stories with accents. I called a Southern friend who had just survived breast cancer. I said, "So what are you up to?" "Today?" she replied in her gorgeous drawl, "I'm going to get my new nipples tattooed on...You?"

More recently, I made pottery for a woman who had just been bat mitzvah ed with her granddaughter. I asked her how it went, and she was glowing as she spoke about the celebration. She started to gush about how much she adores her granddaughter, and then she made a proud reference to the girl's figure. I was sort of shocked and amused but mostly refreshed at her flagrant appreciation for her granddaughter's double-D's.

One friend was a phone sex operator. She got a call as I arrived at her house. She opened the door for me, and mouthed, "This'll only take a minute." She then proceeded to tell the guy on the line that she was a red-headed aerobics instructor with really big nipples. The conversation went on a little longer, but she was right; it only took a minute. She said flippantly as she put on her coat, "He just wanted to hear a woman say the words, really big nipples."