I'll Have The Ravioli With Meat Sauce And Boobs, Please

I am pleased to report that there is justice in the world: Today was the first day of RadiantSmile's new visitation plan, which gives her malignant ex just three days every two weeks, instead of alternate weeks.

RadiantSmile and I celebrated with an impromptu lunch meeting, in between her flight in with her son and her flight out without him. I took her to a wonderful Italian place in Point Loma called La Scala. A conversation with my usual waiter generally starts like this:

Waiter: "Good evening, and welcome to La Scala. What can I get for you this evening?"

Customer: "Well, what's good here?"

W: "I was hoping you'd tell me."

C: "Yes, well, how's the lasagna?"

W: "I'm not sure we have that here. This is an Italian restaurant, after all. Just in case you were confused."

C: "Oh --"

W: "I hear the Chinese is really good here, though."

C: "Okay --"

W: "I wouldn't know, because I never eat here."

C: "Never?"

W: "Never. The waiter never washes his hands."

And so it goes. I had hoped to share that amusing experience with RadiantSmile today, but he wasn't around and we were served by the owner, instead. The owner's a very sweet lady who treats everyone as though they are sitting down for a meal in her home. There is a great deal of trust involved in being served by this terrific lady: she rarely speaks above a mumble, and with a very heavy accent, to boot. She can be intimidating...in that way that only Italian women can be. As she cleared RadiantSmile's plate, she looked at mine, which still had a crust of garlic bread on it, and said, "You're not done. You eat all your bread...then you're done." And then she smiled and walked away without clearing my plate.

It was not difficult to imagine that, if this actually were her kitchen we were eating in, she'd have smacked the back of my head for emphasis.

I finished the garlic bread.

Anyhow...RadiantSmile and I shared the usual easy conversation about life, love, anything, you name it. Keeping up with each other's lives in greater detail than is possible on the phone or by e-mail. It was a leisurely and intimate conversation, the kind you can only have with a friend to whom you'd gladly give a kidney. The kind of leisurely and intimate conversation you might have when you have an Italian restaurant all to yourselves.

After one particular quiet moment, RadiantSmile casually leans forward and says, "I went to see the surgeon who did my lumpectomy. I'm thinking about having some reconstructive surgery done."

I knew, of course, that she had had a sizable lump removed earlier this year and that the lump had turned out to be benign. I had no idea that what had been removed had been enough to require reconstructive surgery, though, and I said so. It's not surprising, since she's small-breasted, but still, you know, from her description of the surgery, they'd removed the lump with a needle.

Clearly, I had an incorrect impression, though RadiantSmile is far too gracious to put it that way.

"The surgeon did a terrific job," she said, "and there's hardly any scar, but one boob is smaller than the other, and it's noticable enough that I didn't want to wear a bathing suit all summer."

Okay.

"The surgeon is a woman and she understands body image from a woman's point of view, but she thinks I'm being ridiculous about it."

Okay.

"I hate seeing the difference in the mirror when I get out of the shower every morning. I want my boobs to be the same size again. Is that crazy?"

No, I assure her. It is not crazy or ridiculous to want to correct things about our bodies that we're uncomfortable with.

She casts a furtive glance around the restaurant, and says, "There's no one else here to see, so would you be offended if I showed you what I mean?"

Um. Hmm.

A number of possible responses appeared, menu-fashion, on the monitor of my Inner Monologue Processor. You know, the device that lets you play several possible conversations in your head before you actually respond to a question that might get you in trouble (or if you're a guy, might get you laid). Those most useful responses were:

a) No, I wouldn't be offended at all.
b) Uh. Ahem. Uh. Ahem.
c) Yes, please.
d) Free the Twins! Free the Twins!
e) Hot diggity! If those are for lunch, what's for supper?

Now, I need to make it clear exactly how confused I was at this juncture. RadiantSmile and I are, after all, not romantically involved. I managed to pull together enough functioning neurons to offer answer "a" for her consideration, and she seemed quite pleased with that one, so I'm reasonably sure I didn't screw up.

She expanded on her story a little more, for effect, and then, after one last quick glance around the restaurant, she pulled the collar of her shirt down to show me...er...what she meant.

Yes, I agreed. They are clearly different sizes. And given that the difference is so obvious, I can certainly understand why she might want to get reconstructive surgery. I told her that, as a man who has dated a woman with augmented breasts, I can say from experience that they do not feel natural at all...my opinion, of course. I told her that if she's doing it purely for herself and how she feels when she looks in the mirror, then she should do what makes her feel best.

And I also told her (with absolute honesty) that I think her breasts are perfect just exactly the way they are, and that she can feel free to show them to me again any time she likes. Honesty is, after all, the absolute best policy.

Hours later, I am still struck by that moment. I must say, it differed a bit from my fantasies.

I don't understand much about women. Very little, in fact. One thing I do know is that women continually test the men in their acquaintance. They do it all the time. So, I am aware that this discussion of her breasts was another of her tests; a cautious foray into deeper intimacy* with a man she trusts. On some level, she wants me to notice her sexually, even if she's unwilling to have sex.

On another, far more important level, she's reached a point where she trusts me with the details of her body image. It's certainly not uncommon for a woman to casually remark that she misses the body she had before she had a baby, or that she wishes she had smallerbiggerfirmerfuller breasts/ass/thighs/tummy, but it's entirely different for a woman to ask, "does this flaw matter to you?"

I don't know. It's entirely possible that, living as I do in a constant testosterone-induced mental fog, I don't get it at all. It's been pretty well established that I am a dork.

*Okay, perhaps not so cautious, being as she was showing me her breasts in a restaurant.