The title is not an overstatement – it was a day which will live in infamy. In fact, could he do so, FDR would come back from the grave, hold a joint session of Congress, and declare war on my sister – as well as on her allies in whatever country manufactured the horrid stuff – for that dastardly surprise attack. But I suppose it would be best for me to explain.
I fully expect no one outside of the men who read my articles to identify with me. My mind shrinks from the idea that most women think like my sister, but it is a possibility I must consider; and since it is a distinct possibility, I expect any female readers of this article will guffaw with outright glee (but with absolutely no respect for the victim) and wanton enjoyment of the sufferings of others. But let it be so. If such a description fits you, then know that your time and your just retribution tarry only so that you may see the light and repent. Now then, the story.
It all took place yesterday, and I must emphasize that I was Mother’s Day shopping with my sister Jessica. As Charles Dickens said in the outset of his classic “A Christmas Carol”, if he had not told you that Marley was dead, nothing wonderful could come of the ensuing story. However, nothing wonderful can ever come out of this story even if I made something up, so I will only say that I emphasize this small but significant fact in order to explain why I was in such an awkward position to begin with.
Our first stop on the journey was Ulta. The word alone will make female readers tremble with whatever it is that causes them to tremble at such words (and to laugh out loud at the fact that I entered the building), but every man knows that Ulta is the single worst place for a guy to be – and Mother’s Day shopping, while the best excuse that probably could be concocted for his presence there, hardly gives him adequate cover. After all, they make handy little items called gift cards, which dramatically lessen the need for the guy to even be spotted on the premises of an Ulta establishment. But I am not here to engage in wishful thinking, for the fact remains that I was at Ulta.
I will now make a detour for the sake of any ladies or dangerously clueless men (clueless, I hope, because they have not yet reached the age of eight; if for any other reason, we need to talk – preferably, for your sake, in private) who do not know why Ulta is such an off-limits place for a man. You see, there is simply no place to hide. Every square inch of that store is covered with something very feminine, whether it’s makeup or nail polish or bath substances or hair care or what-not. There is absolutely no section of that store sufficient for the purposes of pretending you are looking at something while your female friend (in this case my sister) shops around for a painfully long amount of time.
But you also don’t want to stand around blankly staring into space, because then you might make incidental eye contact with a store worker, who will invariably ask you if you need help finding something, even though you aren’t looking for anything and don’t want a soul to know you even exist at that moment. But this is the best-case scenario. If you were to pause at the nail polish section or the makeup section or the body wash section, and a store worker were to ask you if you needed help finding anything, your manhood is lost for at least 72 hours. What do you say to that? You definitely can’t say “Uh, yes, I wanted to know which shade of blush goes best with my shirt” and if you answer “No, thanks, but I’m just looking right now”, you have dealt an equally mortal blow to your own manhood by admitting you were looking. And saying “I’m not looking” would be telling the truth, but the worker would not believe you – only look at you warily and write you off as one of THOSE types of guys who live in closets.
And what of the worst-case scenario? The absolute worst thing that could happen is that the store worker you have unfortunately gotten the attention of is a man – and not just any man. He would be one of those frighteningly fruity men who sometimes work at places like Ulta (don’t ask me how I know; I just do), and believe me – there is nothing worse for one’s manhood than to encounter one of these men in an aisle of Ulta. Trust me.
And now that you know my frame of mind before anything at all even happened, I will tell you the story. My sister and I were in a section of the store that featured body wash and body lotion (I wouldn’t know about that stuff – I only read the labels), and we were smelling the different fragrances to see which one Mom might like. Now, although it was allowable to take the caps off and smell the product, they also had a few handy “tester” bottles. It is only a terrible reflection on the character of my sister that she saw one of these bottles and, almost without thinking and definitely without praying about it first, she yielded to the temptation that entered her mind.
My sister knows that I hate bananas. I have not eaten one in a very long time, and I will only eat them when they are concealed in banana bread. A few weeks ago I was surprised at a restaurant when I bit into what I thought was a cream-filled chocolate dessert only to find that there was a banana inside (my subconscious has since repressed that trauma).
My sister also knows that I am a man, and that I shrink from feminine body sprays of any kind. She knows these things, I say. Yet she deliberately chose to do this terrible deed. She picked up a “tester” bottle of Banana Bliss Body Swirl, and almost before I knew what she was doing and before I had a chance to call for security, she deposited a large amount of it on my left hand. While she laughed and giggled in a, quite honestly, demented way, I endeavored to no avail to get the stuff off me. Now I both smelled like a fruit I detest and had a woman’s substance on my skin. I might as well have put on a dress, high heels, and a Sunday hat while I was at it – that was how far gone my manhood was at that second in time.
I was partially incorrect when I said there is no place at Ulta for a man to hide. This establishment, at least, carried exactly one aisle of men’s colognes. I immediately repaired thither. I lost count of how many different “tester” colognes I sprayed on my left hand in an attempt to de-womanize myself, but suffice it to say that if a store worker had spotted me in the act, they would have thought me a very strange fellow indeed. I cannot say that I smelled particularly good after this. In fact, the combination of all the scents smelled more like raw tomatoes than anything else, and I will likely contract leprosy from all the mixed chemicals. But I no longer smelled like bananas, and the Body Swirl itself was but a distant memory.
However, the blow to my manhood still stung. Some friends suggested that I roll in manure, or belch loudly, or cut down a tree, or set a cat on fire, or withdraw into the wilderness with no supplies, or go on a Men’s Campout – all in order to regain my full measure of manliness. I never did any of those things, for I have come to a very profound conclusion.
You see, I am such a MAN and have such excess manliness within me that the amount of Banana Bliss Body Swirl that Jessica sprayed on me (too large though it was) was not able to put a significant dent in my manhood.
At least that’s what I keep telling myself. For now all I can really do is wait at least 48 more hours.
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