It was only a dream...

So if you are squeamish and/or male, you may want to turn back now. Seriously, this is girl talk. I won't be blamed if you get squicked out after reading the whole thing - you have been fairly warned.

Oddly enough, this is my third visit today to this topic. How often does a person actually need to talk about menstruation? Not very often. This will tide me over for a while, I'm sure.

I had a dilemma today, and found myself in one of those horrible, what the hell do I do now? situations. I had a lunch meeting down in Geneva, and was running out at the last minute to make it on time. I wasn't thinking very clearly at the moment, because it had been a rather exciting morning. More on that later...

So anyway, we met inside the Geneva courthouse, and planned to walk to lunch from there. As we were gathering in the office, I had that feeling. The ladies will recognize it as the omg, I have to go to the bathroom right now or I'm going to have a really big obvious problem feeling. I excused myself, and realized (in great horror) that I hadn't stocked my purse with tampons before I left. I stepped gingerly into the bathroom....where there was not a feminine hygiene dispenser on the wall.

Well, hell.

In the stall, I decided to ransack my purse, just in case. You never know what may end up in the bottom, right?

Balancing the purse on my knee, careful not to let anything touch the floor, and sweating profusely in fear, I found what I believed to be gold. There, at the very bottom, beneath eight tons of useless crap and a cellophane bag of what used to be crackers, was one. lonely. tampon.

With a ripped plastic wrapper.

A lot of things go through your mind in a moment like this.

1. Anything is better than nothing, right?

2. Maybe not.

3. Well, am I better off with a handful of wadded up kleenex until we get to the restaurant?

4. No. No, I am not.

5. When is the last time I cleaned out my purse?

6. I can't remember. This can not be good.

7. I think a family of small rodents may have taken up residence in that purse.

8. Maybe the deodorant nature of the cotton has deterred them from making it into a nest.

9. Can I get some horrible disease from this?

10. What would I tell the people at the hospital?

11. I don't care. I have to go for it.

And so I took a deep breath, tore the wrapper the rest of the way off, and went along my merry way...just hoping that God would shine his favor upon me and save me from the evils of toxic shock syndrome, cooties, and whatever other abysmal evil may be lurking behind the pretty pink plastic.

Immediately upon arriving at the restaurant, I excused myself again, dug a handful of quarters out of my wallet, and made sure I'd be covered for the rest of the day. Still, though, a lingering fear has been tugging at me all afternoon.

So of course, being female, I had to tell someone the story. When I got back to the office, I regaled my assistant with the entire epic saga. She was mildly comforting in her reply of "hey, a woman's got to do what a woman's got to do, right?"

Right. I think.

But what she said next was mind-boggling. I have heard of such things before, but never really believed them to be true. This, my friends, is the bad part.

"You know, I've had a worse thing happen before," she said.

I knew instantly that I didn't want to hear it, but I'd already shared. There was no turning back now.

"A few summers ago, I was out with some friends one night. We were drinking and having a good time, when all of a sudden I looked down...and there was my tampon. On the floor. It fell out."

oh. my. god.

How does this happen??

I did not ask. She kept talking anyway.

"I always have to use the huge super-plus ones, because they're the only things that stay in place. I'd had to get one out of the machine, and it was just the regular kind. So right there in the bar, it fell out on the floor."

Again. HOW?

I mean, let's be honest. Is there anything more horrific in the world?

And just how....you know.....well, HOW??

What kind of cavernous...

I mean...

HOW??

I could understand maybe possibly in some way if it was a little junior thing that was the size of a large grape. Or maybe if she'd been dancing a lot. Hell, I don't know. Maybe not. But what do you DO in that situation?

I think you have to start kegels right then and there, and never stop for the rest of your life.

After faking a headache and going home, that is.

So now I've started doing preemptive exercises, just to avoid ever having to tell a story like that. But seriously. Why would you ever TELL that story? Why?

Now I have a bit of a cough tonight, and I'm thinking it's a purse-borne disease. Which can't possibly be bad as getting the respiratory flu, right?

Meh. Both suck. But neither is as bad as losing a tampon in a bar. I'll count my blessings and take my chances.