Big Blue Marble*

*Addendum to Landscaping


Many people I know have a phobia about parts of their body. For Dan it's his ears, which are incredibly tender. Our dear friend Malcolm has a thing about his eyes. I'm lucky enough to have two "things": my eyes and my belly button. Eye exams bring high anxiety, but this blog is about my belly button. When we were newlyweds, Dan would put his finger in my belly button. I would shriek in terror and scream that I was about to unravel. When pregnancy pushed my inny belly button out, it was a constant source of concern.


But pregnancy was a long time ago, and apparently I didn't think through the full implications of how a tummy tuck would affect my belly button. For those of you who are unaware, during the procedure the surgeon untethers your belly button from it's current mooring and shifts it upstream where it looks completely natural and normal, and looks downstream toward it's now rehabbed neighborhood. The doctor literally stitches your real belly button into skin that had previously been somewhere inches higher on your abdomen.


During recovery I had a circle of stitches that I basically ignored. They were removed at two weeks post-op and the doctor was pleased with how it looked. I went back last week for another check-up. Once again, everything looked great, except, my belly button was shrinking. Really? I thought it looked cute. But no, not cute, it was going to vanish due to the contraction of the circular scar tissue. However, the doctor was not concerned, as this often happened and there was an easy fix.


"Go home and put a marble in your belly button. Tape it in place and leave it there overnight. And repeat until the shape settles in and the shrinking stops. Good? Great, see you in two months."


Dan quickly volunteered that he had a marble. Really? WTF? It's like Wally Cleaver at a swap meet. What grown man knows where he can lay his hand instantly on a blue cat's eye? I was even more delighted to find that he found it two years ago while trenching in a drain tile in our backyard, where it popped to the surface. It had been on a shelf in our bathroom of "old-shit-posing-as-antiques" ever since. Little did I know at that moment that it had more popping to do. He boiled it in a frying pan. The visuals never cease at the Villa Johnson. 


But, back to the subject at hand. I'm here to tell you that a marble either fits into your belly button, or it doesn't. And no amount of twisting, or antibiotic cream lubrication is going to get that marble to sit nicely in your belly button if the marble is too big. I'm a compliant patient. I wanted to follow the doctor's advice. He's the expert and he knows what he's talking about. 


I gave the marble one last push. And--pop!--it vanished. Yup, gone. Well actually, it looked like my belly button was about to give birth to a small blue baby, as about 1/8 inch of the marble was "crowning". And no amount of manipulation got the marble out. It was stuck. 


In a panic, worried that the marble was going to do some permanent damage or get sucked into my body, I had two choices.  Go to the ER, sit there for many embarrassed hours and have it extracted, or wait it out until morning, call the surgeon and have him fix it. He would at least understand, he's the one who told me to put it there! 


I covered it up with gauze and went to bed. At some point during the night it worked it's way out. I woke to find it gently held in place by the bandage. Thank goodness.


Since then, every waking hour, I've been acutely aware of my belly button. I can't bring myself to try the marble again, so I've substituted an ear plug. I go to sleep with my belly button packed and wake up fully aware that there is a foreign object in my remodeled belly button. I'm aware, but fortunately, can't hear any complaints. 

Leave the gun, take the canoli

That’s all the Italian I know.

About three months ago we started “Friday night mystery date.” Dan or I (mostly Dan) finds a fun or unique place to go out, just the two of us. I wasn’t feeling well on Friday, so we stayed in. Feeling responsible for a missed opportunity, I explored some options for Saturday instead. Milwaukee has some long-standing gastronomic institutions. I settled on Mimma’s, an Italian restaurant that has been around forever. We’ve never been there so I thought it might be a nice, romantic destination. I called and made a reservation.

Parking near the restaurant is dicey, it’s in a old neighborhood with limited street parking. Dan circled the block and came upon a parking spot within 50-feet of the entrance. His parking juju. I used to ridicule it until that night—three days before Christmas a few years ago--when we needed to make a run to Mayfair mall. In an endless stream of cars looking for a spot, I turned to Dan and, ala The Ten Commandments, threw down the parking gauntlet. “So where's your messiah now?” or more accurately, “so where's your parking juju now?” With God As My Witness, Dan said nothing, but turned into the main entrance to Mayfair. He waited in the line of cars, and With God As My Witness, he pulled up and parked in the Very Closest Parking Spot to the front door of the mall. I was stunned, and bowed to the juju. I have not dissed it since.

Years later, on a 14 degree night, the juju came through again. We had about 40 minutes before our reservation, so we stopped at another establishment for an aperitif. Thirty minutes later we walked over to Mimma’s.

The check-in area was packed; we barely made it through the front door. A quick discussion with the patient folks standing closest to the door found that they all had reservations and had not yet been able to check-in. No problem, we’re friendly. We continued conversing with others while assessing the situation. I really wanted to eat here. I really wanted some good Italian food. OK, I didn’t plan for a Valentine’s rush, my mistake, but it would be worth the wait.

The 150 year old lady at the check in counter asked once “Do you all have reservations?”  We all nodded and she shuffled away. That was the last thing she said to the crowd. About 30 minutes later a table of two, who’d been perusing the menu and sipping their water abruptly left. A large, visibly flustered waiter (“We only have three servers! We only have three servers!”) walked by and asked where they went. The waiting crowd said they left. “Well we are incredibly busy and I just couldn’t get to them!” At this point Dan began to narrate what should be happening. The curse of working for a company in the top quartile for customer service is that he doesn’t tolerate lesser service well. The hungry, waiting crowd ate it up (pun intended). A table of 4 and a table of 3 were seated.  When the 150-year old came by again she saw the empty table and seated the party of two ahead of us. A nice young couple who had a reservation 15 minutes ahead of ours. 

Dan continued. A little explanation to the waiting patrons. Apologies and a small appetizer. There are a dozen people in line—a quick glass of wine? Nope. Twenty minutes later that young couple seated at the table of invisibility looked over the menu and continued to sip water.  Eventually, that same flustered waiter stopped by and said someone would help them out soon, not sure if it would be him or someone else, but someone would come around “eventually”?  Dan pulled out his iPhone and asked Siri for Italian restaurants in the area. “There are 13 Italian restaurants close to you.” The hungry crowd laughed. Time for us to bail.

We took a short drive to another chain Italian restaurant, again scoring a parking space Right In Front of the establishment. We were seated within 15-minutes, without a reservation. Granted, this is a chain, with a lot of tables and big staff.  It was now 9ish and lunch had worn off completely. Food was on the horizon and I was happy.

Everything is served family style. We ordered a salad and two main courses. We talked and couldn’t help but notice the large table of large folks obviously celebrating some event – probably a birthday, as evidenced by the woman in a tiara.  Our salad arrived and we dug in. The waitress offered a garlic bread basket, but I declined, knowing that it would only serve as a butter delivery system. The large party next to us got multiple pizzas and pasta dishes. Our entrée’s came and we quickly realized we had over ordered. We both ate a portion and sat looking at dinner for the next week.

Desert? No, thank you, stuffed. And then came the lit candelabra and large birthday cake. Yes, it was her birthday. This large table of very large people were celebrating her 23^rd birthday. And really enjoying the cake. A lot. We have been there. We understand. But like a reformed smoker, when you see people that large shoveling in cake on top of an insane amount of food, all you can think about is “must get on the treadmill.” The waitress came back with our leftovers, in four separate containers.  Yup, dinner for a week. 

On second thought, perhaps we should take the gun and leave the canoli. And never diss the juju.


Music that resonates: 
That's Amore - Dean Martin