That said, let's talk about hersticles. Hersticles are the girl beans. Every girl's got 'em. They're all yours. That's the organ responsible for the childhood ability to let caterpillars, worms and frogs crawl all over your arms and show the boys that you're totally not grossed out. In adolescence, they enlarge and allow you to dissect sharks and same arm-crawling frogs and not throw up into your prospective prom date's lap. In adulthood, they are responsible for waxing and waning to allow you to kiss butcher knife accidents from your fiance trying desperately to make you dinner, and then later on hold your vomit once again for the opportunity to remove mud from the baby's mouth, hose off the bare feet after they stepped in rancid dog poop in the yard, and hold the roly-poly your child has brought you because, "it's just so cute!!!".
Now, after childbirth, we all know our hormones change. We get a little more sensitive. That's because the hersticles have released the last bit of estrogen that causes you to gush over babies before you had kids, and forces you to instead reply, "awwww he's so cute!!!! Hope you didn't like sleep!!!!" See? Don't worry: it's not your fault.
The estrogen moves from the hersticles and stops producing there, leaving only your ovaries to produce estrogen, causing it to rummage all around your body and flare up with no real notice or warning. The hersticles leave a minuscule amount of strength and courage inside themselves for you to now only slightly gag and wave your arms shrieking, "THAT'S NICE! NOW GET IT AWAY FROM ME!!!!" when presented with a smelly, dirty, slimy earthworm your kid wants to keep and call Rex.
Now you have massive amounts of estrogen flowing in your body, no longer able to be safe and warm in the hersticles, guarding your ever so delicate femininity and allowing you to brave the world a strong, confident woman.
I'm starting to think of them like little tiny New Year's balls, dropping down, counting down to thirty. I noticed in the last six years my hersticles were weakened after childbirth, but still going strong. Maybe I should make hersticle dysfunction medicine....every year they drop father and farther, and shrink and shrink until you find yourself in dark theater, watching the re-release of The Lion King with 3D glass that do not fit, holding a 3 gallon tub of popcorn that you are sharing with a child 1/3 your size, sure that he will eat it instead of you, watching the opening number of "The Circle of Life", and biting your lip because it is JUST so powerful, feeling the tears well up and the bottom lip tremble. Then, in emergency mode, your hersticles flare up, and you brain gets a message saying, "What the hell is your problem??? You have this on DVD and watch it on a monthly basis! BY FORCE!!" The only cure being to tell yourself to shut the hell up and stuff your face with a $4 box of M&Ms(normally $0.79 at Walgreens), wiping the "extra butter" off your face with your salt-ridden napkin, while your kid looks at you like you're the only mother in the dark not able to deal with a newborn lion cub.
Halfway through the movie, you've managed to calm yourself down enough to eat the next third of the value size popcorn, because you paid a dollar extra and it's really a shame to waste all that popcorn while there are children on Channel 43 starving in tin huts in Guatemala. You wonder, how much would it cost to ship a half bucket of popcorn to Honduras? How far is Honduras from Guatemala? Would you have to repackage the tub or can you stick it in a ziplock bag and use packing popcorn to send it? How close to the rainforest are these places? Would the humidity ruin the popcorn? Maybe double bag it?
Oh No. The hersticles are wilting again.
Uncle Scar just told little, defenseless Simba that Mufasa was killed thanks to him, it's all his fault and he needs to run away. Suddenly, you are not sad, you are not teary, YOU ARE ENRAGED. Just then the only thought going through your head is how his mother should have communicated more, maybe she could tell Simba that Uncle Scar is one of those uncles we "just don't talk to", maybe her lion nanny could have been for better guidance, who didn't see the warning sides that the black sheep of the family lives UNDER A ROCK? You promise yourself you'll always be a better parent and not let anyone hurt your little one, and you lean over to tell him, "I will always protect you. I love you, I would never let anyone talk to you like that, that's a mean Uncle. Your Uncle loves you and would never make you run away. And if he does, you come check with me first before running away, because it's probably a lie".
"Mom, SHH, I'm trying to watch!".....Pout. I hope he heeds my warning.
As you recover from from the rejection, and dip your hand into the now almost empty tub that has yet to leave your lap, you wonder why your butter popcorn at home doesn't taste this amazing. It doesn't look like butter when they pump it all over your popcorn, is it really butter? Why do they call it butter if it looks like oil, I mean, who are they trying to kid? Has anyone ever asked if its made from real butter? How can I make my oil into popcorn butter? Should I re-butter if I sent this last handful to Honduras?
You are interrupted from our calculation of exactly how many situps would be needed to erase 14,000 calories worth of move theater popcorn, by the revelation of Simba to come home...at the exact same time you realize you have never noticed Simba is Mathew Broderick. Simba never sounded like Ferris before-no matter, he is running towards the heavens because his father is talking to him...
Suddenly the hersticles, in one last ditch effort- croak. The tears come rolling down. You don't call your father enough. You should probably call your mother too for good measure at this point. To explain the anatomy of a hersticle and beg for forgiveness for milking hers to extinction. It must have been your fault. You have never wanted to hug a cartoon lion so much in your entire life. Your child looks at you and asks, "What's wrong Mama??" and all you can muster through your blubberings is, "Se---e---e---whh---whh--whhaaaat---haaa--ppens---when----yyou---don't----lli--llisten----to---your---faa-faa-faa-faatherrrr??????"
The movie is over and frankly you can't take much more white water emotional rafting. Wiping off your greasy face and trying to align the makeup back onto your eyes as your child tries to leave without you, at this point you agree you can't blame him, you straighten yourself up and leave the theater. As you're leaving, the child says, "Can we go to the arcade?"
"No, Son, I've just racked up my credit card for $87 worth of emotional therapy."
"No, Son, I've just racked up my credit card for $87 worth of emotional therapy."
"Ugh, you NEVER let me do anything."
"Really? After I take you to a movie, buy you popcorn, eat your popcorn, eat your M&Ms, cry all over you and tell you how much I love you and will be happy to hoist you up on a rock for all of Brookfield Zoo to see, it's not good enough for you??? Whatever. Get in the car."
THERE we go! Found that hersticle dysfunction medicine. The salt, fat, and chocolate has kicked in! You are woman, hear you ROAR! I make the rules, Mr. Sassypants! I put you on this Earth, I'll take you off! I love you, that's WHY I won't let you drop $5 of tooth fairy money in a claw machine!!!! Don't cross this woman, she's a force to be reckoned with!!!
Can we get that in a pill???
