Body accessories

I’m not writing about clothing or shoes. Sorry. But while looking up information about my husband’s Becker’s nevus (a patch of thicker-than-normal hair on his arm) I discovered that there’s a rare association of Becker’s nevus and accessory scrotum in the genital region. Yes, you read that correctly. Accessory scrotum. Conjures up images of a safe place to hide your spare car key, doesn’t it? I think it’s sort of comforting to know that this accessory is always found in the genital region and not hanging off one’s neck or elbow. Honest. You can read it for yourself at http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/1016681-overview. And just so you know, HabMoo doesn’t have this particular feature and has to find another way to carry his phone and keys while biking.

The standard definition of an accessory organ is any organ that assists with the functioning of some other organ. But apparently accessory in the context of other body parts just means additional or unnecessary. So what other body accessories could you possibly have, maybe without even knowing it? What might you want to show off at the next holiday party?

A quick search through emedicine.com leads to the following:

• accessory tendon [in ankle]
• accessory ribs
• accessory lung bud (Probably not appropriate for your crystal bud vase.)
• accessory lung lobe (For those who want a bit more bling than a bud, I guess.)
• ostia (This just means opening or orifice. So if you’re always finding coffee stains where you don’t expect them, maybe you should check for an unnoticed ostia. But I only read about it showing up in the fallopian tubes.)
• accessory urethra
• residual accessory ovary (Residual, or left over, from what? I find this a little disturbing. God sometimes has extra inventory of ovaries and so throws one in as a bonus?)
• accessory spleens (Perhaps a source of income on the black market for organs.)
• accessory mammary tissue (Would this qualify you for a discount on your boob job?)
• accessory thymus body along the line of embryonic descent (I read that up to 25 percent of us might have this. So if you know how to follow that line, you might want to check.)
• accessory lateral collateral ligament (ALCL) [in elbow]

Just as an aside: You can get “Special body accessories” with the Sweet Escape Package at LE DAUPHIN HOTEL & SUITES. I don’t have any idea what they mean by this. I just thought you might want to know.

Gamekeeper’s Thumb?

I knew about tennis elbow, but had never heard of gamekeeper’s thumb. I mean how many gamekeepers are there these days that they warrant having a condition named after them? I assumed it has something to do with getting your thumb caught in the gate latch or bit by an elk. But forever in pursuit of knowledge, I looked it up. Actually the “condition was most commonly associated with Scottish gamekeepers, especially rabbit keepers, in whom the injury was work related. The injury occurred as the men sacrificed game such as rabbits; the animals’ necks were broken between the ground and the gamekeeper’s thumb and index fingers.” (source) I also read that it’s very similar to skier’s thumb. Such an obvious connection once you think about it, I’m sure.

I discovered that tennis elbow is now called lateral epicondylitis by people who can pronounce that last word.

Other injuries I found named after a sport are skier’s thumb, jumper’s knee, swimmer’s shoulder, Little League elbow, and female athlete triad. The last one is not really an injury, but rather a collection of disordered eating, amenorrhea, and osteoporosis associated with female athletes.

I’ve also heard of runner’s knee, which is really Iliotibial Band Syndrome and really hard to find a rhyme for.

Trigger finger seems to be a more common ailment for knitters, gardeners, and cello players than it is for gun owners.

Shouldn’t there be a dancer’s toe pentad for bunions, ingrown toenails, sesamoiditis, and general ugliness? And maybe rodeo rider’s groin?

I eventually found reference to millipeders’ back and birders’ neck. I’m probably more likely to get one of those. Or gamer’s fingers. Playing video games and coloring at too young an age will deform your fingers says Mike Tomich who has a Web site that somewhat resembles malformed fingers: http://www.miketomich.com.

Alien pelvic exam

Did this title get your attention? This particular string of words got mine when I was looking at stats for how people are finding my blog. “Alien pelvic exam” was a search string used not once, but twice, to find my site. I have to wonder why someone is looking this up.

Have aliens now given up on the anal probing? Have they learned all they can from investigating our colons? Do you know that I was not able to determine from a simple Google search just how long anal probing has been going on? That seems like important information we should have on hand.

Have they moved on to the pelvic exam? Was my unknown searcher or searchers worrying about this or hoping for it? It would really help to know if the searcher was male or female. I mean I hope it wasn’t some guy hoping for a YouTube video.

But this has got me thinking. Do you think my insurance would cover an exam by an alien ’cause I’m really tired of going to my doctor and getting a postcard the following week telling me that I came up positive and need to schedule a colposcopy. I think I might have more trust in the results of an alien testing. And maybe it wouldn’t involve a drive across time or waiting in a room full of sick people for my name to be called. Maybe, just maybe, it wouldn’t even involve the stirrups and I wouldn’t have to decide whether it’s more or less ridiculous and humiliating to wear my socks or take them off. I’m sure the entire process would be more comfortable with an alien.

Even though Google let me down on the history of probing and on any good hits for “alien pelvic exam,” I did learn that “recent studies have shown that the majority of people who have UFO an abduction experience also happen to have RH neg blood.” Since I’m pretty sure I’m not in that category, I’ll probably have to schedule my regular exam with my regular doctor. Damn.

An Ode to Idleness

Begun on April 10

I hope that you, gentle reader, do not really expect to see an ode here. That would mean work on my part, and this post is all reflecting on idleness and the good its done me. So no ode. At least not yet. I am, however, going to disagree with Mahatma Gandhi and Benjamin Franklin. So that might make continued reading worth your while.

Today I reflected on the happiness, perhaps even joy, I’ve been feeling the last few days. I wanted to know the source. I feel gratitude. I feel at ease, both with myself and with others. I feel forgiving. These are virtues which do not visit me often enough. So why did they stop by now? Was it the coming of spring? Could it just be more sun and longer days? My friends seem to be greeting the season with bouts of depression, but I don’t recall feeling this good for so long in any of the previous few springs. So I think this is not just a Spring Break visitation.

I intuit that these feelings of wealth and contentment and rightness flow directly from my continued idleness. But could that be possible?

An idle mind is the devil’s workshop.
- English proverb

Isn’t this what you learned, too? I learned this lesson so well that I used to start getting fidgety and nervous if I took over an hour for lunch. I learned that the human spirit is in constant peril and can only be saved through duty and service to others. I was taught to despised the (perceived) idleness of both the poor and the wealthy are to be despised.

Idleness is the Dead Sea that swallows all virtues.
- Benjamin Franklin

Mr. Franklin wasn’t a Puritan, but he sure sounds like one here. I’m not sure he was the most virtuous of men. Is it possible that his need to be constantly in motion produced both his inventive genius and his “illegitimate” son? Could he have been driven by a need for fame and attention? Are those virtuous drives? Perhaps he really was simply industrious and would have been put on Ritalin if he were alive today.

Purity of mind and idleness are incompatible.
- Mahatma Gandhi

So does this mean that if I’m quietly listening to the robins sing and luxuriating in the feel of a sweet, warm breeze crossing my checks, my mind is somehow soiled? If I’m feeling generous and forgiving in my silence and my stillness, am I somehow deluded and confused? I’m sorry, sir, but I disagree.

Idleness is sweet, and its consequences are cruel.
– John Quincy Adams

It is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes comes to the top.
Virginia Woolf

I’m more inclined to believe these quotes. It’s true that if I’m not employed and bringing home an income, I could suffer consequences. In fact, I anticipated that and worried a bit about it before I quit my job. I’m going to have to give up buying plants this spring and I’ve already given up eating several meals out each week. But these have not been cruel consequences.

It’s the unexpected results of idleness that have been both cruel and enlightening. I have had nightmares about work; and since I’m not immediately getting up and going to work, I have the time to examine and feel more deeply those dreams. I get their full effect. When idleness challenged me to act creatively, I learned just how much I fear that side of myself. When pushing myself towards productivity, I can ignore that fear and many other fears. I can much more easily ignore myself.

Idleness is to be dead at the limbs but alive within.
- Fijian proverb

This is where the cruelty or grace will appear: within. It’s such an unknown landscape, this self within me. I spend so little quality time with it as an adult. Yet it’s very much alive and changing–a wondrous landscape of desires, tastes, prejudices, delights, worries, and joys. You might have a better map of the terrain than I do. You can watch me avoid an obvious swamp that I politely ignore and remain willfully ignorant of. You might know of a playful sea that I turn my eyes from in order to stay firmly planted on the shoreline.

I feel like I’m now returning to the childish or childlike (you make the choice of word, dear reader) fascination with my interior moods and movements. I feel like I’m watching myself grow. I’m not on my way to being a grownup, but I am on my way to being an orphan. And that’s just as important and as big a developmental step.

When idle, I can wonder about my own value to my household and to the world, but I’m less inclined to do this when I’m not rushing about trying to prove my worth to an employer or spouse. I’m more inclined to act–when I do act–out of a spark of energy or out of a desire to give back in gratitude. Both the spark nor the gratitude are discovered in the times of idleness.

In idleness there is a perpetual despair.
– Thomas Carlyle

Again, I must disagree with an esteemed gentleman. Perhaps if I did not enjoy being with myself, if I could only find fault with myself and my surroundings, this would be true. But I’m discovering just the opposite. I see beauty and creativity around me. I see hardships ahead, yes, but I do not despair over them. And it’s only because I’ve had the time to reflect and notice the rhythms of life that I’m able to be so optimistic. I can feel my own strengths when I am idle. I can recognize the supports around me only when I’m not rushing around trying to ensure their stability. I’m discovering just how little I need to be contented.

Since you’ve been so good as to read this far, I am going to leave you with quotes which better resonate with my recent experience.

In producers, loafing is productive; and no creator, of whatever magnitude, has ever been able to skip that stage, any more than a mother can skip gestation.
- Jacques Barzun

To loaf is a science, to loaf is to live.
- Honore de Balzac

A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labor and there is an invisible labor.” - Victor Hugo

Far from idleness being the root of all evil, it is rather the only true good.
- Soren Kierkegaard

Idleness is only a coarse name for my infinite capacity for living in the present.
- Cyril Connolly

It is better to have loafed and lost, than never to have loafed at all.
- James Thurber

Cat hair is for the birds

When I was growing up I sometimes found birds nests made of horse hair. It seems to be an excellent building material. Now that the cat is shedding I thought I’d see if birds ever make their nests out of cat hair. There are two nests in the bushes in front of my house, so empirical evidence suggests that they do not. However, Cornell University’s All About Birds site says that they do.

Cornell suggests putting out any of the following:

• Dead twigs [check: got plenty of these]
• Dead leaves [check: too lazy to ever rake]
• Dry grass [nope: dug up entire yard years ago]
• Yarn or string—cut into 4- to 8-inch pieces [hmm, what colors?]
• Human or animal hair (especially horse hair) [Hab Moo keeps his hair too short, but the cats and I have plenty]
• Fur (e.g. dog or cat fur) [um, isn't animal hair and fur the same thing?]
• Sheep’s wool [nope: might have a sweater I could cut up]
• Feathers [don't they have their own?]
• Plant fluff or down (e.g. cattail fluff, cottonwood down) [nope, no fluffy plants]
• Kapok, cotton batting, or other stuffing material [Kapok? Nope, I don't live in Mexico or further south.]
• …

Cotton batting? I now know how to get rid of the old futon in our bedroom! Ripping into it will be a fun project. Once Hab Moo sees me collecting my hair and pulling stuffing from a mattress, he’s sure to be impressed. He’s a bird watcher, after all.

You can actually buy kapok pods for a couple a bucks a piece if you don’t have any other option because you’re a bald and petless person with allergies to natural fibers living in a parking lot or something. And who still has birds around.

I think birds will really try just about anything. As much as I’d like to forget, I still vividly remember seeing a baby bird swinging out of its nest with plastic from a cassette tape wrapped around its neck. It swung for days until it was just bones. I’m glad the days of cassette tapes are over for just that reason. I’ve also seen nests with tinsel from Xmas, and pieces of plastic bags.

I’m not sure that it’s quite time yet for the birds to start building nests. There certainly isn’t any mud around for the robins to use to build theirs. My bird bath has been very popular with them in the last few days. Perhaps I should make a mud pit for them.

Do you think the neighbors will think I’m a little odd?

Assonance in the family

I was getting a little family history out of my mother and was struck by the names in her family. She had the following female cousins:

• Eva May (with a long e)
• Ila (long i) Ion (long i and o)
• Una (you-na)

Una seems to be an Irish or Scottish name (she was a little of both) meaning “lamb.” Ila is Sanskrit, so I have no clue how they came up with that one. Ion, according to name searches, is the Basque and Romanian form of John. So maybe she was named after some Basque or Romanian friend of the family. Or maybe it should have been Ione.

Mom’s mother was Eva (with a short e, thus the Italian, rather than English, pronounciation) and her aunt was Ivy. Someone is the family must have been very found of vowels.

So were the parents of the twins my sister went to school with: Echo and Elmer. Poor kids. Mom knew twins named Isel and Flavel. Now those are some good names; not common, but I did find a few people out there lucky enough to have them, although Flavel is usually a last name.

Moms’ father’s name was Emil. Another “E” name, but a pretty normal one. She recalled some other male relative named Enick, but maybe it was really Enoch.

My mother’s parents continued the vowel obsession in their own way. In 1921 they made up a name. Actually they made up a spelling of the name of one of their friends who was named after two aunts. Mom’s name is LaMata. So the a won the battle of the vowels that time.

None of these names is being continued in the family. The middle name Faye is in its fifth generation, however. The four living women with that name all have a red birthmark on the back of their heads, at or above the hairline. I’m a little bit jealous that I’m not a Faye.

The only name that continues on my father’s side is his mother’s maiden name: Albert. I think Dad, my nephew, and perhaps his son all share that middle name.

My middle name? Well it’s another a: Ann. It’s better than Adelia (my father’s sister’s name.)

Introversion

I’m surprised by how comfortable being alone at home is to me. I knew that I loved it for a day or two, but I thought I’d be bored by weeks of it. Not yet. Right now watching myself heal from my former work situation, struggle with trying creative activities, and taking care of my mother has given me plenty to ponder and observe. I’m probably a little overly interested in myself but I am fascinated by self-awareness. It seems so elusive. Just when I think I know myself I either change or someone points out the obvious which I had somehow missed.

I’m particularly struck by how little I crave contact with others. I just had an interview and told the interviewer that I am an introvert. She expressed disbelief. People usually do. I can be rather animated and sometimes it’s quite easy for me to talk. I grew up in a loud household where I had to compete to be heard. So I’ve learned how to project my voice and how to get attention. But I came home and took a nap after that interview. She was the first person, other than my husband and the plumber, who I’d spoken with in several day and it exhausted me. Not only did I have to talk with people I’d never met before, but I had to talk about myself.

I know that friendships are important, that they satisfy a real need in everyone, and that I enjoy seeing my friends. I just seldom feel the need to interact with people. I almost never call a friend. And it’s difficult for me to plan a party or gathering. I know my friends care about me, and most of the time that’s all I seem to need.

I miss living in a dorm or in a commune. I could usually get the amount of alone time I needed, and when I did feel an urge to be with people they were right there. The same was true when I was working. I could get short spontaneous interpersonal interactions and these were satisfying.

The less I practice interacting with people, the less confident I am about my ability to be social. I used to write down comments and conversation starters I could use at gatherings, so I wouldn’t be at a loss for words once I was there. I don’t have to do that much any longer, but I do still feel jittery sometimes, even with very close friends. Seeing others requires me to refocus, to be alert, to get my timing down, and do the niceties I don’t always understand or appreciate.

Today I’m going to take solace in the fact that I’m an INTP–a personality type shared by only one percent of the female population. So, of course, I feel a bit like an alien. I also feel special and unique. It’s not such a bad trade-off. I just hope my friends  understand that I love them even if I never ever call them.

I think I’ve become a housewife

I’ve been out of work for over 11 weeks now, and I think I might be a housewife. I’m not sure that a former radical lesbian feminist is allowed to become a housewife, but for now the identity seems to fit. This morning I asked my husband if he wanted me to make him turkey and cheese bagel sandwich for lunch, I did the laundry, and I just got back from grocery shopping. I think the only thing saving me is that I didn’t pick up after the kids or take one of them to the doctor. Since I don’t have any kids, it has been fairly easy to escape such duties. But I still feel like I should go out, buy some fabric, and sew myself an apron.

Grocery shopping is a different experience on a weekday morning than it is on a Saturday afternoon. For one thing, I don’t hate it as much. The few people in the aisles are mainly old and easy to maneuver around. I’m not rushed to make my spaghetti sauce decision. I can ponder the advantages of basil or green pepper or sausage. I have the luxury of considering what I might want to have for supper tomorrow, rather than what I might have time to fix. I’m looking at fresh veggies instead of frozen dinners. I don’t think I’ll ever enjoy shopping for groceries, but it’s not the chore it used to be.

Saturday mornings are no longer devoted to laundry. I can do it pretty much whenever I like. I’m looking forward to warmer days when I can hang clothes on the line to dry. Everything I’m washing these days can be thrown in the same load. I’m not washing work clothes that have to stay bright, or sweaters that can’t lose their shape. I’m sure HabMoo would prefer not to have any more pink socks, but I’m not terribly concerned.

I can now tell you which of our mail carriers has delivered the mail, even if I don’t see the carrier. The older white guy comes around 3:45, the younger Asian man comes around 9, and the surly middle-aged white guy comes around 2. The guy that comes late is more likely to give me my neighbor’s mail than the others are. I get a little upset around 2:30 if there’s no mail yet. I know he’s going to be the one coming up to my door.

When the furnace broke and when the water heater broke, I didn’t have to worry about when I was going to be able to take time off work to have them replaced. Anytime was a good time. And when the plumber who was supposed to come in the morning didn’t show until the afternoon, I didn’t sweat it. No problem.

My house isn’t noticeably cleaner, I have to admit. One day I washed walls. HabMoo didn’t notice and I really haven’t either. So the walls are going to get dirty again. But all my boots have been cleaned, polished, and water proofed. Since I have a dozen pairs, this takes a bit of time. And I think I’m going to finally conquer that slowly draining sink by pouring down it the hot water I don’t use for my tea. I have the time to see if that experiment will work.

There’s one activity that makes me feel much less like a housewife: playing video games. I don’t recall my mother ever concerning herself with leveling up, or weapon purchases, or unlocking new maps. I do think, however, that sitting in front of Facebook is a lot like sitting in front of a soap opera story.

For now, I guess I’ll allow the housewife identity sit with me. Housewife or unemployed. These days being a housewife seems more unique and interesting.