When
I sat down to design a new blog, the first thing I needed was a name
to match the ideas I wanted to write about. I wanted a word that was
old (like me) and something relative to women's
issues (because I am one). Something from the past to remind us of
what we were and what we were made to endure and a word that would
show what we are capable of in the present day. Something to
celebrate where we are now and something to make us laugh while
struggling with all the hard work we (and those following us) have
left to do. A blog on modern feminism, middle-age aging (yes, I plan
to live to the ripe old age of 120 years which makes me middle-aged),
writing and the day-to-day life of a menopausal woman in today’s
world.
So
I hit the internet to see what I could find. Any excuse to surf …
to do research. Corsets
certainly gave the wrong impression (and I can’t fit into mine
anymore and when I could, I needed help getting back out of it which
led to the real reason I wore one in the first place). And the name
wanderingwomb.blogspot.com
was already taken. Great blog by the way (check it out). I know my
womb has a mind of its own and it has been known to wander off. More
like it has led me astray a few times.
Then
I thought, I know, the perfect name. The
Vapors.
So back to the internet where I found two different spellings of the
word. The
Vapors
or The
Vapours.
Actually, I like the second or British spelling better than the
first, but spell check and search engines like the first even though
it was also the name of a new wave pop band (which I also confess to
liking). Let’s just hope readers click on the right link. “Oh
man, check out the do’s on those dudes.” Uh … not my blog
site. But the biggest hit you get on the word Vapors
are ecigarette web pages which just depress me because I’m still
smoking the real ones. (Big hit … get it?)
A
search for The
Vapors
led me to female hysteria where after reading the symptoms such as
faintness, fluid retention, insomnia, sexual desire and a tendency to
cause trouble, I discovered (oh shit) I already have The
Vapors.
But wait … I also thought I had the new mosquito disease
chikungunya virus after reading all its symptoms. I really need to
stay off the internet. Wonder if there’s a name for the illness of
thinking you have a disease from reading all the symptoms on the
internet. Maybe I should look it up. Maybe I should invent one.
I’ll call it Cyberspace Malady (does that word look like ma’ lady
to you?). I’m pretty sure what I really have is menopause with a
predisposition to cause trouble and an affliction of mouthing off.
But
what if I did have The
Vapors?
Then I’d have to carry around a bottle of smelling salts in my …
cell phone case? Cleavage? Corset? And what the hell were smelling
salts anyway? Come to find out (yes, thank you God Google), smelling
salts were made from the shavings of harts’ horn (ammonia) or
spirits of harts’ horn which are the horns and hooves of the red
deer. (Why didn’t they just call it Horn of Red Deer?) I just
want to know who lassoed the deer (yes, I do know better and what the
real way was). But really? Hart’s Horn? If I were writing it in
a story, it would be Heart’s Thorn Spirit with magical properties
to assist the person who was helping me out of the corset but he
would have to shave a deer first to prove his virility.
And
who can completely condemn a condition where the treatment was the
doctor gave you an orgasm to release the female semen? If my doctor
offered that service, I would go a lot more regularly (if I still had
the health insurance to pay for it, that is, thank you Healthcare.gov
and wonder how you would file that with the insurance company who
would deny it anyway). If it wasn’t illegal, I’d be out there
hiring someone to play doctor with. Of course, real male doctors
found it took up a lot of their office time (and wrist action) to
stimulate a woman to orgasm (shocking, I know) (wonder what the other
patients thought those moans were coming from behind the door) so as
an added benefit resulting from The
Vapors,
they invented … you guessed it, your friend and mine … The
Vibrator
which has caused a many a vapor to rise up through my body and out
the top of my head and even occasionally, through the soles (my soul)
of my feet (batteries not included).
Seriously,
I know that The
Vapors
were used as an excuse to portray women as weak, to lock them away in
asylums and to steal their wombs away from them. But let us not
forget the very last definition of The
Vapors
that as a Wiccan Witch I love and that is to cast a spell using
Spirit
of
Heart’s
Horn
while I wave my magic Vibrator
and Vaporize
all the wrongs in the world.
