Who Knew?
It used to be different
Your parents picked one out
You maybe got to meet him once
before the big day
And that was that; simple, right?
Today we have endless possibilities.
We get to shop
pinch, squeeze,
check for soft spots, and rotten cores
before we put them into the cart
and bring them home.
A sharp few get free samples!
Parents, relatives, the family pet, the goldfish, plants
and the residual offspring
from the last vain attempt at matrimony
all get a shot at playing detective.
If he looks, sounds or smells off
it’s over.
And so it goes, back and forth, round and round
until the happy day you say, I DO!
Especially if there’s a dress, cake, crystal and fine linen.
Never mind you are in hock for the next hundred years
And that the bank gets what’s left of your anatomy
You are in love!
Everything goes really well throughout the honeymoon
Just that little scuffle, over nothing really, too much luggage
But he’s perfect; he picks up after himself and; get this girls,
HE CAN COOK!
Although it is a gamble, it does require effort and good recall
especially when those little annoyances start to crop up.
And there is the slight chance that they will turn on you
from all your daily devotion and care
and start to actually expect, consistent good treatment, until death!
Sometimes thirty, forty or even fifty years go by, well past any hope of regaining your lost figure and skin elasticity.
This is when strange growths start to pop up and you can’t remember the last time you had your period or what you did with your dentures?
Then you learn to cope with the little tics, a veritable sideshow of frolicking fun.
Belching and farting take a back seat to these jaw-dropping marvels.
Sneezing, spraying cold germs over a six mile radius
walking naked on the patio with a towel in one arm
and holding one finger on a nostril and blowing the snot out the other side
and then wiping the juicy remains into said towel,
or the ever favorite, hawking up a loogie and sailing it past the dog.
The possibilities are endless for the mature madam.
Of course you can always counter, with some unique sounds and gestures of your own.
Savor the possibilities!
You could
back up; try to sit on them, while using the commode in the dark
or squeeze a dab too much soap
into their favorite coffee mug.
Prepare yourself!
It will result in some hedonistic repercussions,
percussion being their expertise.
Unfortunately, as with all gaming activity
we eventually must face up to the fact
that perhaps our luck has run out, we need to move on, cut our losses
quit while the going is good.
Make alternate plans
like retail therapy, escape into a movie,
adopt a Pomeranian.
Take a long hard look in the mirror
have a talk with our post-menopausal selves.
Ladies, take it from me, it is cheaper to keep him
And you get to keep the hairdresser and your credit rating.
Do you remember
when divorce wasn’t even an option
when they put a scarlet letter on you?
Do you remember when they use to
accuse you of being a witch
burn you at the stake?
Talk about your odds?
I mean, what if the Martians
that we were
created to mate with,
had pursued love instead of war?
Had planted cash crops, practiced random acts of kindness,
been vegetarians,
listened to their mothers or done any retirement planning?
Who knows where we would be today?
Instead their legacy left us dependent on dinosaur juice
and double dog daring dictators
while wasting money we don’t have
on an angry planet still in the throes of labor.
A planet that doesn’t care
if our thin sausage casings
survive her vog thrust ratio
not to mention, escape the pull of gravity.
A bit technical, I know, but
everybody knows that, for better, usually gets lost
when it’s time to go to Venus and visit the relatives.
And worse, is what you get
when you let the Martians
direct the satellite broadcast
while driving the spaceship.
