so. vaginas.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking “oh good lord, here comes a post about the idiot in Michigan …”
But this post is not that post. You can write that post in your head: just say “vaginavaginavaginavaginavagina” and then make a donation to Planned Parenthood or your friendly local women’s health clinic (although of course “local,” at this point, might mean anywhere in a three hundred mile radius) or to the Michigan legislator who thought it would be all right to talk like an adult in the company of other adults. Silly woman. She should have just talked about “her lady bits” and then everything would be fine.
No. I’m not writing that post. But I am thinking a lot about vaginas. Which is actually unusual for me, because although I own a vagina, I don’t really think about it that much.
I’m thinking about all the ways in which vaginas have been in the news lately – and that the impetuses (impetusii?) of these news stories are seldom, themselves, the owners of a hoochie.
The battle over Planned Parenthood funding? Started by non-vagina owning persons.
The constant fight to erode (or erase) access to safe, professional abortions? Championed by vagina-less people.
The endless iterations of mommy wars, which look on the surface to be all about vaginas? Fostered and publicized by vaginas absentas.
What is it about “down there” that causes vagina-less folk to want to police it, regulate it, tell it how to behave (and how not to)?
Is it that you can’t really see a vagina? Is it that most of it is all, you know, mysterious and tucked in, and thus needs constant vigilance lest it – what – run away? Have vagina owners, unbeknownst to me, been clamoring for help at the local sheriff’s office: “help! help! my vagina ran away and I can’t find it anywhere! she’s off somewhere, gambling away the rent money!”
I mean, is that what we’re dealing with? Vagina-less people are so concerned about what an untrammeled vagina might do that they want to put up a veritable thicket of laws and policies to prevent vaginas from vagina-ing all about the town? Is the idea to create a sort of legislative chastity belt for vaginas?
What’s the worst thing that could happen, do you think, if vaginas were left alone, to sort of vagina around in their natural habitat? Would they breed wildly, out of control, like what happened when people stopped shooting deer in New Jersey and now you can’t even grow a goddamn tomato in the backyard without all the deer for forty miles doing the tomato happy dance and bam there go your hopes for a nice little red sauce?
Is that it? Are the vagina-less attempting to erect these pieces of vagina-repellent legislation to keep herds of vaginas away from the tomato gardens of privilege and power?
What would happen if all the vaginas got together? Would they have a vaginabellion? Are we talking hoochie biker gangs rampaging through the halls of power, terrorizing the non-vagina’ed?
Think about it. Have we ever seen what a vagina can do when she puts her mind to it? I’m thinking that after about Elizabeth I, the answer is pretty much…no. And of course Liz I kept her vagina firmly on the throne by claiming that her hoochie was virgin territory, which is not a game that the hoochies I know are willing to play.
Word on the street these days is that vaginas are getting really irritated by all this scratchy legislative underwear. And an aggravated hoochie makes Liz I look like June Cleaver.
If I were vagina-less, I’d be spending less time thinking about how to legislate that which I don’t have and start paying attention to what I do have, so that when the vaginalution comes, I don’t lose it all.
i’m linking up with all the people at yeah write – some vagina’d, some not – and you should probably go over there and visit. you never can tell what will happen on the grid: you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll maybe even get to look at some cartoons. click over to the challenge grid, and then the hangout grid, and then come back to the challenge grid and vote for your five faves.
Vaginalution. I done died laughing. Ever since Lisa Brown was silenced, I’ve been answering my husband’s inane questions at home like this: “Have you seen the yellow screwdriver?” “Vagina what?” “Did my mother call?” “Vagina who?” “Where’s the damn plunger before this toilet water spills onto the rug?” “Inside my va…” I could barely get it out; that one was clearly only funny to me. Seriously, all this talk about lady gardens makes me fearful for where we’ll be when my daughters’ vaginas are as old and used (ha!) as mine.
Omigod that’s hysterical. Which is to say hymenisterical. The plunger is particularly funny/not funny. The future confronting our daughter’s vaginas is indeed gloomy (and I don’t even have a daughter) – I remember waaaaay back in college, when I went on all my protest marches and pro-choice rallies, thinking “YEAH! THIS IS IT!” Seems we haven’t come such a long way, baby… sigh
2012 and vaginagate all over the internet. Twitter went nuts with that word.
Felt like doing a PSA saying ” if the word vagina scares you, stay away from the internetz today.”
xo
see the comment below, in which Carrie says something is “vaginalicious.” She should send that word to Beyonce and collect a copywrite fee!
This was really funny girl.
Oh thank you for saying something new about vaginas. I am sick of hearing about vagina absentias talk about vaginas. It’s repulsive. Very good post. You got my vote.
i think sometimes you *can* talk about something if you don’t have it (money, for instance, or political freedom, or skinny thighs) but in this particular instance…nope. I’m not going to tell someone what he should do in terms of circumcision, or prostates, or any of those really fun intimate bits. so ditto on the hoochie, dudes, BACK OFF.
AHAHAHAH. Awesome. I love you Vaginalicious post! And I agree, those people who have no vagina need to stop protesting its every vagina move!
vaginalicious!!! perfect! wish I’d thought of that!
I have been scared of the vagina for a number of years. I can honestly say that I think if I owned one, I’d just be more scared. That being said, I do happen to love them, particularly my wife’s.
This is incredible. Love it.
So funny! New word of the day: Vaginabellion. I will try to use it in a sentence.
In other news, my 20 year old texted me just this morning to tell me she was “getting her vagina done.” There was a lengthy pause in our texts as I contemplated all the various things her text could mean. I finally gave up and just asked.
Turns out in twenty-speak that means hair lasering. No more bikini line shave bumps. But I wouldn’t be surprised if her lady bits rose up in a vaginabellion at the thought of a hot laser near them.
See there, I used it in a sentence!
Great post! I thoroughly enjoyed it. The mental picture of a herd of grazing vaginas looking for a tomato garden will keep me laughing all day.
Vaginas? LASERS? mmm-nnnoooo! that’s why god invented the boy-short bikini bottoms, so the lady parts can stay just as they want to be, without any interventions. but I bet that texting stream is pretty damn funny.
I’m raising vaginas on my farm. Three of them. And when they grow up, their vaginas will have teeth to defend themselves. Because my daughters can do any-damn-thing they want with their vaginas.
Men… Once they come out a vagina, they just can’t wait to get back in one…
HA! yay for raising vaginas. as it were. it does seem that all these men-folk who are sooooo concerned about the whys & wherefores of vaginas…one wonders why they’re paying so much attention?
I was considering allowing my vagina to have my vote in the upcoming election but it can’t reach the levers. At 38 years old I am a little shocked that so many of my peers seem more comfortable with the slang terms for vagina than the word itself, even if it’s “vulgar”. My vagina and I put it to a vote, and we’ve decided to call it by it’s given name unless it’s in bed with a really attractive and educated PENIS!
Maybe your vagina could stand on a stool to pull the lever? I love this comment! Kudoes to you and your hoochie!
I love that you wrote about vaginas. I have a horrible habit of reading ahead (no matter what I’m reading – in fact, I read the last sentence on the last page when I start a new book). Anyway, I digress. I was reading all about vaginas and then I saw “little red sauce” and I thought you were describing a vagina’s time of the month and I was thinking I had never heard it described that way before, but what the hell, read on, I’ve gotten this far already. Then I realized I was totally off base and you were talking about tomatoes.
tomatoes. yes. but until just now I didn’t link “little red sauce” with the monthlies…HA. Funny. and a little bit gross, frankly. You read the last sentence of a book before you start? how do you then go ahead and read the whole thing? interesting…
Sorry, I agree that was a little gross. It was like a train-wreck thought and I couldn’t stop it. Kind of like the vagina. At least in the eyes of legislators. The last sentence of a book thing is just one small part of my special brand of crazy! Ah, neuroses.
Hahahaha I love this post. It’s always terribly ironic where you see a pr photo from some kind of women’s issue and its a bunch of old white men shaking hands with one another. Maybe vagina-people should start worrying about the penis?
Mandatory prostate exams? on a MONTHLY basis? just a thought…
Vaginus absentus. I think that’s where I lost it. My 12-year-old daughter became alarmed at the strangulated laughter and came to check on me. I debated and debated, then decided to let her read your post, since she is the owner of a vagina herself, and attends an all-vagina school where things like this may come up. Beyond the humor, it did open up a conversation. Thanks for that, and for writing this post.
I’m glad you could talk to your daughter – it took me a long time to be able to have these kinds of conversations with my mom – not because she was squeamish but because *I* was. A MOM? with a VAGINA??? eeeuuuwwww…. And of course, weirdly, ironically, sadly, when I was growing up, in the early 80s, vaginas weren’t as policed as they are now.
Awesome. I love this fresh take on the subject. Well done!
A funny post about vaginas is worth its weight in gold. Vagina gold. Not sure what that is, but it sounds disgusting. Loved your post!
thanks – vagina gold is indeed a hell of an image…hmmm….somehow I’m thinking about Rumpelstiltskin. STOP!
Thank you for finally using vagina as a verb, as it deserves. Vaginaluia! Ellen (Very good points with much humor)
You wrote this well. I liked the humor and I know once my vagina gets something in her head, there’s no stopping her. 😛
I can’t help but wonder what the united Arab emirates would think about you and your vagina. Although back here I’m pretty sure my husband already thinks that my vagina is gambling away our mortgage payment.
Viva la Revolution!
Well, I’m thinking that the UAE doesn’t have much use for my hoochie, frankly, or for hoochies, generally. Which is a problem, obviously. All these abayas… robed hoochies, walking. BUT there are (small, incremental) changes happening, and in a weird way there is something to be said for clarity. Women here have nowhere to go but up, as it were, whereas in the States it seems like there are many forces coming together to push women back. It seems, sometimes, that women had more freedom & opportunity twenty years ago, when I was young (sob, sob, yes, it was that long ago), then they do now. And i don’t think it’s just my age and general decrepitude that make me feel that way. … Sux about that mortgage payment, btw. Speak sternly to the hoochie about her gambling problem.
YES, THIS => “Are the vagina-less attempting to erect these pieces of vagina-repellent legislation to keep herds of vaginas away from the tomato gardens of privilege and power?” This may be the vagina post to end all vagina posts.
I don’t think anyone has ever used the word “vagina” so many times in a post of this size. Well done! You should win an award…a Vadgie maybe?
I enjoyed your post!
I think only vaginaticians should rule over vaginapolitics. And, we’ll leave the penisticians to rule over their dicktics.
fantastic. i’m not even going to make any puns.
haha. oh, that we {ahem. and by “we” i may mean “men”} could just leave be what doesn’t need to be ruled over, and get involved and passionate about people who need a voice.
wouldn’t that be nice? giving a voice to the voiceless? what a great idea.
“vagina around” that might be the best phrase ever.
Love it. More people should talk this way.
Was it the Mayan calendar that predicted 2012 would be the year of the vaginalution?
Or maybe it was Sarah Silverman. I can’t remember.
funny, funny, funny. I think it was the Mayans…or the Vaztecs?
This is by far the best vagina I ever read. Ups. The best post I ever read. The end!
Hilarious!
Vaginalution. WIN.
It all started when Eve ruined everything. Whomever came up with that story must have had some serious “mom” issues. If only the snake would have been an awesome therapist instead of the devil…and would have spoken to Adam, of course, instead of Eve.
Great post.
mmmm….have you read the Philip Pullman trilogy called _his Dark Materials? They made a really bad movie from the first book, The Golden Compass, but don’t let that sway your opinion: he basically re-writes the Eden story…sort of along the lines you describe here. Let’s just say that the serpent comes out much better in Pullman’s story than in those other books…