Of Hope, Belly Fat, And Battered Cross Trainers

Summer swoops down on us like a murderous flock of sparrows, and the heat assaults us in a blitzkrieg. It drives away most of our lucid thoughts except the constantly pressing need to seek shade and pursue any stray flurries of cool air.

The heat finally melts away the thick blanket of doom and gloom surrounding me, and suddenly everything seems bathed in light. Never mind that our very young and very pregnant landlord & landlady have raised our rent by a thousand pesos. Never mind that the global economic chokehold has strangled dead any hope of our building a house this year. Still, the sun is so very bright and the future practically dazzles us. We will prevail.

For self-professed creatures of the summer, Atch and I are woefully out of shape. Beach season is upon us, and each morning we force ourselves to get up an hour earlier in the hopes of getting some exercise, only to fall back into delicious sleep like rancid Jurassic pork.

I unearth the elastic binder I used to wear after each of my sons' births, and it keeps my prodigious gut in so my office uniforms still fit - in a manner of speaking. But, Wonder of wonders, the binder curtails my voracious appetite. In two weeks, I trim an inch off my middle.

Encouraged, I offer the binder to Atch, but he shakes his head disdainfully and turns it into a running joke (look at my Aifee, so desperate she's wearing body armor), all the while sucking his breath in as much as his tummy will allow. I am still wearing my old maternity dresses on the weekends, so much so that my sister-in-law's husband takes to asking, sotto voce, if I am pregnant again.

By some stroke of luck, and the siren call of an empty refrigerator, we finally get to lace on our ancient walking shoes and pound the pavement for the 20 minutes it takes to get to the nearest market. We stock up on fresh vegetables and a newly murdered chicken before making our sweaty breathless way back on foot.

We are exhilarated. Already, I feel the surge of energy burning the calories, melting the fat, and incinerating the thick cobwebs from my mind.

Summer is here, I whisper to my battered cross trainers, same time tomorrow?

An Idiot's Guide To Cock Smashing. Or Husband Smashing. Whatever Works For You.

The tingle running up and down your spine that you used to have on every first day of school? Yes that's it. The notion that you've forgotten everything you've learned the previous year and the sinking feeling that you'd have to start all over? That's exactly it.

Rusty. You could almost feel the hinges of your joints squeak-creaking like the heavy doors in all those horror movies. Your palms are clammy and your grip slips...

Swoosh! You slice the air...and the cock sails harmlessly across your head, its crown feathers tittering in your ear in the mocking sing-song

(you'll never catch me... you'll never catch me...)

of kids who used to goad you at playground tag.

"Aifee, eyes on the ball!” Atch hisses through gritted teeth. “Move your feet!”

The score is 11 – 2 in favor of the opposing team and Atch is losing face in a big way.

It is our first badminton game in three years and we are playing doubles against two of Atch’s co-workers. Two of Atch’s young co-workers. They are lithe and quick and energetic, and above all, (did I mentioned this before?) young. How I envy their quicksilver forehands and monumental smashes. They rush forward and lunge and sidestep, their feet seeming like blurs on the rubberized court. They also call me “Ma’am”. (Oh, the shame!)

Finally, the game is over. The opposing dream team has won, 15 – 2. We walk back to the bench. I am out of breath and my cheeks are on fire. Atch has put on his poker face, but I can feel him seething, seething, seething.

So like Atchbund to make me feel unworthy without uttering so much as a word. I look at him and suddenly my crumpled self-esteem manages a modicum of outrage. “I haven't played in a long while, Atch, “ I blurt out defensively. “I haven't even had time to practice.”

“I know.”

His face remains as impassive as any heavily pancaked Japanese geisha's and so I try again.

“Its just a game, Atch, why are you acting like it's a life and death thing?”

Atch looks at me like I should know better, “its competition, Aifee. You just need to concentrate.”

What?! I join your frooking badminton game to have some fun and to raise my heart rate a little

(said heart rate not having risen this much since you got me knocked-up for the second time)

and I get the old “le visage blanche” for my trouble?

I immediately feel like putting his face through the strings of my old reliable second-hand Dunlop and I tell him as much.

“So why don't you?” He is bullish. The Atch-hole.

On the drive home, after half an hour of silence, Atch reaches out to give my hand a reassuring pat, “You just need to concentrate more, that's all.” And after a pause, “'Wuv-wuv, Aif!”

Remaining quarrelsome and resentful, I glare at him.

The following weekend when we go out to buy some newly-pirated 8-in-1 DVD's, I get a copy of the Badminton For Everyone. I make him pay for it.

He does.