Me and My Belly

Some women get the belly as they age. Me, well, I have always had the belly. The belly has been hanging around on and off since I was about eight. Back then, it made me feel awkward and obvious. And, while I still feel its the most obvious thing about me after my red lipstick and blue eyes, I no longer feel awkward about it. That is until tonight when I was standing in the checkout line at the grocery store. As I tumbled into the counter with my arms full of necessities and impulse purchases, the clerk remarked that it must have been hard for me to carry all that in my "condition." Condition? Was she referring to the fact that I have Graves Disease? Gosh, my eyes haven't been bulging in over a year, and my neck is slim. She couldn't possibly know I have Graves Disease. Hmm...was she referring to the fact that I obviously had forgotten to take a shopping cart with me, as I loaded up my arms and any other extremity with a hinging joint? No, no that couldn't be it. She didn't give a second look, as I pulled a bag of tortillas out from under a carton of sour cream; both of which were tucked in the crook of my neck. With the flush of confusion and the thought that I had heard her wrong, I trailed her eyes down to where she was focused on my belly. At that moment, she started talking about when she was pregnant, and the realization illuminated me like a spotlight. Before I could correct her, she was deep into some explanation of how she knew she was pregnant with a girl because her daughter kicked her all the time. "No son would do that to his mother," she said. It seemed rude to tell her the truth, so I smiled and chimmed in at the appropriate spots. I said things like, "yeah" and "wow." In my mind, however, I was already dialing my best friend to ask her if I looked pregnant. Well, I'd ask her after I was again able to speak a full sentence. It's hard to actually form a word when your bottom jaw is busy scraping the ground next to your self-esteem.