In a small one-bathroom house, that one bathroom is sometimes the most important room in the house.  Especially with 4 people living under the same roof.  It wasn’t so much the case for us.  We were always pretty well-timed with bathroom time and rarely had to argue over someone using too much time.  Oddly, the one thing in the bathroom that we DID have to argue over was the bathroom mirror.

There were only two mirrors in that house large enough to be used for vanity use; the small mirror above the bathroom sink and the mirror on the dresser in my parents’ bedroom.  He used both.

He would spend close to a half hour some days posing and staring at himself in these mirrors.  He would turn this way and that examining himself, admiring himself, worrying about his body.  Then we would hear the words, “Honey, do I look big today?”

Arnold Schwarzenegger was his idol.  I’m not proud to admit that I’ve seen the movie “Pumping Iron” at least three times.  Sometimes he would go into a frenzy and make frequent visits to the gym and sometimes he would slack.  There were whispers of steroids.  There were protein shakes, dozens of supplements to take every morning, revealing clothes to showcase his physique, and always with the damned mirrors.

“Honey, do I look any bigger today?”

Being skinny and weak looking was a major fear of his.  He wanted to be impressive.  He was a walking, talking pile of machismo wannabe and desperately needed a mythic physique to prove to the world that he was wonderful.

He was constantly comparing his body to other men.  Tall men, lean men, large men, they all seemed to intimidate him.

He was not a very tall man.  Not quite six feet tall and I think it bothered him.  Tall men intimidated him.

Although he worked hard in the gym to get his body looking a certain way, he was not athletic.  Athletic men intimidated him.

He felt he wasn’t bulky enough to be truly impressive.  Large men intimidated him.

He was constantly asking for reassurance.

“I’m bigger than he is, right?”

“My biceps are much more toned than his, right?”

“My legs are much bigger than his, right?”

“I could probably bench more than that guy.  Who cares how fast he can run!”

I think when we think of body image issues and self-doubt we automatically think it is a problem belonging almost exclusively to the female sex.  I beg to differ.  He may not have worried so much about being fat or double chins, but he most certainly obsessed about his body and the way his physical  being impacted people upon first sight.

The next time you make the rude assumption that only women obsess over body image to the point of being annoying and/or unhealthy, come talk to me.  You are SO wrong.

I am going to assume that none of my readers are unfamiliar with the Rapture craze/joke/drama that happened over the weekend.  In assuming that, my life is made easier by not having to do a backstory and attach a bunch of links so you can read the whole mess.  So from that assumption, my starting point can be:

You and I both know how it went down (umm, it didn’t happen) and while I, myself, made a few little jokes on Facebook about the Rapture supposedly happening on my wedding anniversary, I don’t find the whole situation all that funny.  Especially when the people who believed the thing would actually happen are involved.

Harold Camping is a very very old man.  Harold Camping seems to have a bit of an unhealthy obsession with end-times predictions.  Harold Camping made a really big fucking boo boo.  But that’s his business and I can roll my eyes at him forever now.

My eyes are not rolling so much at the people who believed Camping.  I feel really really bad for some of those people.  Not everybody went to the extremes.  Some people just packed up their families and went on a roadtrip to be in a central place when they all would supposedly be taken up to heaven.  They simply get to deal with a bit of egg on their faces in this aftermath.  The people my heart really cracks open for are the people like Robert Fitzpatrick.  People who sold everything, had their pets euthanized, spent all that they had to “spread the word”.  There are going to be quite a few people really hurting in life.  People left jobs and homes behind.  This isn’t funny.

Even less funny and more disturbing to me is that both Camping and Fitzpatrick are now changing the story a bit.  To people who so firmly believed that May 21 meant something, they could not have been totally wrong.  Their “faith” simply won’t allow it.  So now they have changed their story and are saying that May 21 was a spiritual judgement and that October 21 is actually the day when stuff is going to happen, but not just the Rapture.  Everything is going to happen on that day.  The faithful will get saved and the sinners will get judged, all in that one day.  And apparently, Camping and Fitzpatrick believe WE HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Aside from my initial “Are you fucking kidding me?” reaction, I have to wonder how many people will hang on to this “prophecy” this time around.  I worry how many people so distressed over the impending end of times will try to kill their families and then themselves.  I worry how many people  this will leave destitute and in need of help.  It’s not funny.

If I am at all annoyed or angry, it is at these so called prophets who are a loop in the noose that will kill Christianity as an organized religion.  While I, myself, shy away from religion as an organization, I understand why it can be a good thing and why my own faith has helped me in my life.  The idea is good, it’s the people that make it bad.

This just isn’t all that funny….

Like so many other people, I am an individual who is constantly startled to find a gigantic bruise or blood-gushing cut on my body and having no idea how it got there. I’m clumsy. I run into walls, I drop things on my feet all the time, I am always burning myself on hot things in the kitchen. That kind of stuff happens.

A few weeks ago I burned my finger rather badly on a hot pot in my kitchen. The thing pussed and bubbled and I swear I heard it sizzle when it hit the pan. It was gross and painful took quite a while to finally smooth out. It was really noticeable and people kept asking me, “WTF did you do to your finger?”

I took a picture of it and posted it on Facebook and one of my friends casually made a joke that Jessie had done it to me. It was funny because Jessie would NEVER IN A MILLION YEARS hurt me physically like that. And that whole conversation had me remember something that happened when Jessie and I were still in college.

I was working at the library. It was summer. Jessie and I were living together. One night we were playing around and he playfully nommed all up and down my arm, not realizing he was doing it a little too hard. I moaned about it for a minute and then forgot about it. When I went to work the next day, I took off my over-shirt because the part of the library I worked in had no air conditioning and my boss had no problem with my wearing a tank top while doing my work. She came over to my desk to ask me a question and scared me by yelling, “Oh my God! What happened to your arm?”

Confused, I looked down to discover that the entire back part of my arm was covered in several large black bruises. I, of course, burst out laughing and explained that my boyfriend and I had been playing around the night before and he accidentally got a little too rough.

Her eyes narrowed as she stared me down.

“You don’t have to make excuses for him, you know.”

“WHAAAAAAAT?????” My mind shrieked.

She walked away then and never brought it up again but as I sat there completely confused I started giggling.  She thought Jessie had physically hurt me on purpose??  It was hilarious to me.  I had to leave my desk and run outside and call Jessie to inform him of what just happened.  He didn’t find it as funny as I did.  He was horrified and very upset that he had bruised me so badly (that’s the kind of guy he is).

I still find it funny.  I made DAMN SURE to marry someone who would never ever use his size to overpower myself or my children.  There’s a good reason for this.  That good reason is why I can laugh about things like that now.  That laugh is a sign of a well-healed scar…much like the one on my finger from that terrible burn.