Soup Bowls (a.k.a. Fake 'Uns)

My friend’s husband hates fake breasts.   He calls them soup bowls.   He is a self described “boob and leg” man.   When his wife faced breast cancer and in time a radical double mastectomy it hit her obviously hard; but for a man who loved his boobs, he never allowed the shadows of disappointment to cross his face.   My friend’s wife decided that she would give a prosthetic bra a chance till she further had time to research more fully on getting implants.    Her husband was unwavering in his support.   Whatever she wanted he was for.   In a conversation we had soon after the operation he told me hoped she did not ultimately decide she wanted implants.   He said he could live with whatever choice she made, it was her body after all; but he would rather be left with the memory of her real breasts to fantasize about than grabbing a hold of two stiff and cold soup bowls when they made love.   Ultimately she chose that she did not need nor want implants and settled and in time even retiring the prosthetic bra.

To say that her husband was also not disappointed about the fact that his wife had lost her beautiful breasts would be a lie; however he was over the moon she had decided not to opt for implants.   He was one of those rare individuals who had fallen for the “whole package.”   He loved her heart, soul, spirit, and strength as much as he also loved her long gorgeous legs and overall great curves.   She was definitely a woman who had a gorgeous smile but also smiled through her eyes.   A couple of years after she had died we were hanging out and a mutual friend was seriously motivated on getting our friend back into the dating pool; but at this point I knew his lack of dating was not from lingering grief, as much as he just did not want to play the dating game.   He feels you don’t have to look for love or even friends instead he believes like I do that those meant to be in your life will somehow come into our lives.   Now our buddy definitely was on the market, whether he chose to be or not, he is a looker and has grown into a hot silver fox.   It was astounding how many women and men tried to get in his pants; but as he reported to me he had already had the best in his life sexually and spiritually so he was fine using his right hand for his horn dawg moments.   He shared at one point that the last few years of his wife’s life (even without her breasts) and even up until the last few months that they had continued to have a really hot sex life and for him he felt once you’ve had the best then there was no amount of porn or one night stands that was going to do the trick.   AMEN brother!

At the time we were living in southern California and it is somewhat true that it is hard to find a woman or man for that matter with real breasts, especially in southern California.   It is true that there are silicon valleys in every neighborhood in California thanks to the popularity of breast implants.   I even heard this one statistic on a special news documentary that American teenage girls are more apt to ask their parents for breast enhancement surgery over getting their first car now.  

One night we were out and the first part of the evening we hung out at my widowed friend’s favorite straight bar and the latter half we went to my favorite gay piano bar to listen to another good friend do her usual Saturday night gig as San Diego’s favorite chanteuse extraordinaire.  As per usual our other friend, after a few cocktails, started pointing out all the “hot babes,” for our friend’s benefit.   It was useless to stop him once he got going.   Beyond always being on the search for his own Mr. Right, he took it upon himself to also do research for the rest of us.   This matchmaker trend continued all night.  At some point at the gay bar my straight friend turned to me and quipped that maybe it would be easier if he were gay because at least he would not have to deal with fake tits.   I cleared my throat and pointed out four gay men across from us with pec and chest implants also sporting spray tans.   He was in disbelief.   I explained that indeed in the gay community there were as many “Ken Dolls,” as there were “Barbies,” in the straight world.   In my slightly drunken slur (allegedly) I said, “Yep the world sure is full of fake ‘uns!”   My Southern accent tends to be more pronounced when the cocktail catches up with me and trips up my tongue.   Obviously my friend (a true Californian) got beached on the “uns,” as I tried to explain over his ribbing and laughter that “uns,” was a hillbilly southern version of “ones.”   The point was the world, but more specifically American society has become plastic and fake.  

This discussion turned into an almost sobering conversation/debate.   Once again allegedly “almost sobering,” and allegedly a “conversation,” and only a debate because some alleged drunker queens listening in decided to defend plastic surgery and judging by the botoxed big lipped faces debating us I guess our conversation may have stepped on a few toes or plastic “Ken Doll,” parts.  

Anyway I begin to theorize how we as a society will chose everything from astro turf to imitation crab because, I guess, fake is easier? Cheaper?  Easier to clean?  We can take almost any body part we don’t like and replace it with a fake but theoretically better or perfect part.  As the heated debate begin to dwindle into a more slurred jab fest we saw a huge waxed and botoxed hair plugged muscle man literally bulging out of his tank top followed by a bleached, spray tanned, over collagen-d, silicon tittied fake Gucci sunglass wearing gal pal.  They both looked equally deflated when they did not get carded at the door.   The guys around us gasped like teenage girls watching the star quarterback as the rip off ripped man strutted his way thru the crowd.   His bleached hair blinding bleached toothed female companion followed and she respectively got the proverbial approving gay gasp for having a “perfect,” body.   The queens turned to us as if these two walking and breathing plastic humanoids were proof positive that their points on the merits of plastic surgery won.  

I’m not so sure it won; but it sure proved the point that whether you thought the Ken & Barbie were beautiful or not, everyone could still tell they were no longer made up of their own original body parts.   Beauty may be in the eye of the beholders but for me and my friend the proof was in the plastic~ no one could dispute their surgical adjustments and additions, not even the queens.   I guess for them it is more important to buy a house that looks like a shiny new mansion on the outside than seeing if it is in decay and falling apart on the inside.  

I am not so PC or high and mighty enough to say I would NEVER have surgical cosmetic adjustments, but I’m just saying if my intention is to turn back time (sorry Cher) and look “natural,” I can’t expect that I would really pull the silicon over anybody’s eyes.   Fake looks fake no matter how “artistic,” or good your surgeon is.   There may be varying degrees of how artificial the “work,” done may look; but eventually, one day your knock off body part is going to be caught with its “Made in China,” tag sticking out.

My friend and I looked at each other in total amazement that these queens had obviously missed the point.   We took one more look at “Ken & Barbie,” as they were comically (or tragically) trying to feel the straw to their cocktails thru their swollen collagen lips as we clicked our cocktail glasses in unison.   Chuckling, my friend exclaimed, “soup bowls!,” and I slurred “fake ‘uns.”