15 tits out!

i've become mildly obsessed with cleavage lately. not that of others or even my own, but more the culture of cleavage. the bizarrely contradictory level of social acceptability surrounding the whole bosom business.

ironically, this can be traced to the last man man show (an exceptionally testosteroney venue for breast awareness, i'll grant you). when K and i sat atop a radiator amid a crowd who weren't even born when we were entering the sixth grade. it was a crowd in which we were the only ones going even remotely tits out. and this is me we're talking about, so it was pretty remote. nonetheless, it's an odd context- one in which i am considered to be giving a peep show.

for those of you who don't know, cleavage is a very very strange thing. we gals have little control over it. mine made its accidental debut at junior prom, where even The Dear Gay One was left stammering and speechless. since then, there's been many an unfortunate slip. many a time where things have not stayed where they were supposed to be. and i'm not alone in this. lindear, at least, is with me.

but the thing that i've noticed, the thing that amuses me to no end and has me thinking about this now, is that if you are buxom, you can do whatever the hell you want. you can let it all hang out and somehow it's not pornographic. it's accepted. because it's there and where the hell else are you going to put it.

but, if you're less than buxom, it's a whole other world. because there's this prevailing sense that any cleavage has been created. that it's artificial and deliberate, and, therefore, it's in appallingly bad taste. it's shameful. it's very very wrong. which is not at all right. because, though there may be less of it, what the rest of us have happens to be there as well, and we also have nowhere else to put it.

i'd been noticing this strange dichotomy for awhile, but it was only today that it really hit home. today, when a woman with what can only be described as knockers leaned over, revealing a broad, uncovered breasty expanse as she told me, her brow furrowed, her tone stern, dear, please cover up.