Jumbo size. Small thoughts.
Each person has a story. Most yearn to be told. Each deserves a limelight. Without such tales I wouldn’t have a job or cocktail conversation.
This afternoon I passed the magazine rack at Safeway. My eye fell on Fast Company.
Cover story: EXTRAORINDARY WOMEN.
I wish these articles had been written in the 80’s when I had a bit longer runway ahead of me and could have been inspired by the sisterhood instead of momentarily discounting my less extraordinary accomplishments.
How, I wonder, do male readers respond? Do they think, “Ah, my equal at last!” or “I’ve done more, where is the story about me?” or “Great. Another ball buster.”
All this thought took a fast moment, mind you. I had gone to pick up bathroom tissue and was quickly on to comparing carrying an economy pack through the streets of Portland to exiting a drug store in Tulsa in the 80’s with boxes of tampons. With all my powers of observation I have never (thankfully) seen a fellow buying condoms, hair growing tonic or… fill in the blanks, as you most likely know more than me.
When I lug 6 bottles of wine home in a carrier, I build semi-athletic looking arms and most everyone strikes up a conversation: “Where’s the party?” “Your evening looks more promising than mine.”
Carry a 30-pound bag of dog food several blocks and you get smiles all along the way, but bathroom tissue… nothing but silence and averted eyes. Still I buy the economy pack. The JUMBO one that fits in no brown bag yet made.
Last time I made such a purchase, Pepperidge Farm cookies were on sale. Now that’s a backbone-building combo when one unexpectedly walks home from Safeway with a handsome, younger male neighbor. Of course I didn’t think to look in his shopping bag. Wonder what I would have found if I wasn’t being so typically self-conscious.