Overthinking the Magic Bra

Sandra and I were shopping for bras in what is still called--in this day and age!-- the "Intimates" department when I saw it: the Maidenform Women's Ultimate Push Up Bra

Have you seen this thing? "Add two cup sizes!" it promises, as well it should, since it seems to contain a small throw pillow's worth of padding in each cup. The bra was pretty ridiculous, really, so we gave it its proper mockery then continued with the special hell that is bra-shopping. [Oh, men, you don't even know! The egregious misstocking, the deciphering of strange terms (is "demi" good or bad?) and the hideous also-rans (I'm talking to you, green pin-striped push-up bra.) It's enough to drive you to the smelling salts, quite honestly.]

After some time (hours? days?) I had gathered a few bras that appeared that they might work (though "gathered" is not nearly a strong enough term for the savage, skillful foraging it took.) Though oddly, as though guided by some sort of unseen force, I kept finding myself circling back to the Ultimate bra. "Oh look," I thought to myself, with a forced casualness that didn't fool me one bit. "It's that ridiculous bra again." In a jump of logic that remains unclear to me even now, I concluded, "Well, may as well try it on."

I did, and well....DAMN! I had huge boobs, insanely inflated porno boobs, boobs that could not be tamed by man nor bra. My bosom, as they say in the romance novels, was swollen. My cups runnethed over. I was like the chick in this photo modeling the bra in question, but...more. Way more. My boobs were so huge, I was unclear on which side of the sexy/comically large divide they fell. "Sandra!" I called to the other dressing rooms. "You must come in here and behold my giant boobs." She looked. "Damn!" she said (as well she should.)

"I don't know...I look...different," I said, hoping Sandra, who knows about such feminine matters, would tell me whether to get it or not. Sandra took charge immediately. "Well, girl, I look different when I'm not wearing make-up--that doesn't mean I don't wear it, " she said definitively. "You Are Getting That Bra."

So I got it. And it sat, unused, in its preternatural perkiness on my dresser. I put it on only two times. Once to show Leah and once to show my husband. "Look at my boobs!" I said. Leah looked. My husband looked. "Damn!" they said.

I liked it. Kind of. I think. I don't know. The bra was becoming... problematic. I just couldn't bring myself to wear it. Was it indeed sexy, or was it just too damn big, borderline silly? Would I feel comfortable showing up to my usual haunts with my suddenly gigantic rack? (It should be noted that I already have a pretty smokin' D cup, but the difference with the magic bra was noticeable, way noticeable.) What if someone started flirting with me just because of my big fake boobs? Would I be irked that they were into something I didn't actually possess? Hey, my eyes are up here, Mr. Big Boob Lover.

And what if you were still dating and wearing this bra? The padding was so flippin' thick--would you even notice when things had gone to, as we used to say, second base? And what about a "home run"? As you flung your bra to the floor, so would go your boobs, piled there on the carpet, still waiting perkily at attention. (Warning: never do your real boobs look so dreadfully inadequate than after taking off the magic bra.)

The magic bra was causing me to overthink. I mean, not that I control the direction of society with my bra choices, but did I really want to be promoting this as what a women's chest should look like? By wearing the bra, in some small--albeit, incredibly busty--way, I would be raising the bar of what a woman's chest was supposed to look like. If my D-cup needed enhancement, what about my C, B and A-cup sisters? Would they be forced to don a completely fabricated chest, similar to those boys' superhero costumes with the build-in foam muscles? Would we one day just all don our blonde-haired, big-boobed, sweetly smiling full-body foam costumes, completely covering our unworthy, misshaped, shameful selves? No, by jingo! I would not be a part of it!

I found the tags and the receipt for the bra. I had to return it--for the Good of Society.

But first I tried it on one more time.

Damn.

xoxo
jill

Addendum: Btw, if you, like some of the commenters below, wish to play your part in bringing down society, you can get the thing--it's full of lies, I tell you!--at a department store like Kohl's or order it via In Bed With Married Women through the link above:

Major Boobage

If you have absolutely nothing else to do, take a peek at Playboy's oddly fascinating article, Evolution of the Boob. You needn't read the article--I suspect it might have been written by the Playboy office chimp--but do look at the pictures. They trace the styles in boobage from 1950's airbrushed boobs, through pendulous 70s-style breasts, to comically obvious round 80s implants, to the present day, which Playboy seems to think is sort of a golden age of appreciation for all types o' boobs. "...As long as they're bare and attached to a thin, blonde women," gripes Jezebel's Margaret Hartmann in When Your Breast Shape Goes Out of Style. Hartmann makes some good points. Obviously women's boobs aren't "evolving" by mutating into pointy, round, or perky shapes, depending on the trend. Or at least they aren't doing so naturally. If one were to truly keep up with boob fashion, as defined by Playboy, it would require seasonal visits to the plastic surgeon's. "Hey, check out Karen and her winter 2008 boobs. How can she even leave the house like that?"

Whatever. Yes, it's fucked up that boobs have trends and that women feel like they have to follow those trends, but I still say you should look at the article, if only to see the gravity-defying missile-shaped boobs from the 1960s. Does anyone remember the formidable bust lines of moms, teachers and matronly neighbors of that era, jutting out somewhat alarmingly under their sweater sets? This is what they had going on under there?

And consider poor 70s chick, shown below. With those kind of free-range breasts today, instead of high-tailing it over to Playboy demanding to be a centerfold, she'd probably be bereft over what she perceived to be her hideously sagging boobs (and, if the rest of her body is equally 70s-style, making an emergency appointment for a major bikini wax.)

So, no, boobs aren't "evolving." Which, actually, is kind of disappointing. Because if they were, I would totally want some of those awesome pointy 1960s boobs. Besides their most obvious application--mesmerizing others to obey my every whim--I'd also use them to point to distant objects, put people's eyes out, locate water sources, direct traffic, tune the TV... Oh, I would so wield that rack.