Can You Empa-thighs?

      A new fear gripped me today. No, not about the economy, or the war in Iraq, although both those agendas could strike fear in the heart of any American. Indeed, my fear did not come from global "climate change" or whatever we are calling it now, and it is not from life's uncertainties that undoubtedly lie ahead.
     No, fear struck today as I sat innocently in my Grandmother's mahogany dining chair (as I am right now,) getting ready to click away at the keys on my laptop. As I waited for some witty, inspiring comment to flood my cerebral cortex, I leaned back and lazily dropped my arms to my sides, and that's when it happened.
     Instead of feeling the chair against my hand as I was subconsciously anticipating, an altogether different sensation marked my arm, then made it's way up to my brain and back down behind my eyes which opened wide in response. What I felt wasn't hard like a wooden chair, but rather, it was kind of soft and spongy.
     It was... my...gosh, I can barely say it...my thighs. Oh.... my.... goodness..... Seriously?
     Could this seriously be happening? The middle-age "spread" as it were? I've always heard about it, but listened with an indifferent ear like one might about an impending deadly virus that is claiming lives in other parts of the world, but too far off to impact the present. But apparently, I did not exercise the appropriate amount of healthy fear when I should have, so here it is, larger than life. In what seems like an overnight event, my legs have decided this chair is no longer large enough and they are scouting for new real estate. Or perhaps my outer thighs are trying to emancipate themselves from my inner thighs in a surreptitious internalized fat coup.
     At first I just sat there, stunned, letting the horrific reality sink into my paralyzed mind. Then I did the worst possible thing a woman can do in this situation: I felt them again. And again, kneading and poking as if this would cause them to deflate and go back to their prior, mind-accepting proportions. 'What's next?" I thought, having to scoop my chin off the kitchen table like a growing ball of silly putty, right in the middle of consuming my super-sized platter of burger and fries?
     The worst part is, I don't remember this being the case just yesterday, though I may not have been giving the matter proper attention as I've been preoccupied with sedentary blog writing and mindless ho-ho munching. I'm just saying, it feels unfair, that's all. No warning, no incremental graduation of flesh, no formal announcement, just poof! there they are, thigh 3 and thigh 4, like two bowls of rising bread dough spilling over to meet the floor.
     I think tomorrow I shall choose a different venue for writing, such as a double-wide chaise, or better yet, the middle of my king size mattress. Hopefully I'll have at least six months or so before my thighs crawl off the edge of that and maybe by then I'll have figured out a way to be creative while I'm on the treadmill. In the meantime, I'm adopting a personal "don't touch-don't tell" policy with my own thighs . Now that's something to really be afraid of.