The Total Femme

Tex and I both frequent the same acupuncturist, a wonderful woman called Huang Yu (her real name!). She puts needles in us and gives us Chinese herbs in a valiant attempt to cure what ails us, or at least to make us a little healthier. She learned her medical arts in China but has been in the US long enough to know that Americans are a special breed, sometimes needing to be treated with kid gloves and a good sense of humor.

Tex has always been plagued with restless legs at night, and as she ages, it’s been getting worse. Huang Yu is determined to help her with this extremely unpleasant and disruptive syndrome, and has been needling her and giving her Chinese herbs like there’s no tomorrow. After a visit with her mentor, a Taoist master who lives in New York City, Huang Yu recently let Tex know his advice for an extra added ingredient to her herb mixture: silk worm poop.

“Don’t tell your wife!” she giggled.

“Are you kidding me?” Tex replied. “That won’t phase her!”

It doesn’t. Hey, lots of people eat insects, and if a little worm poop can cure my sleepless hubby, then so be it!

“Doesn’t taste like anything,” Huang Yu assured us.

Goose poop, on the other hand, must taste ambrosial, given the way Thatcher our dog gobbles it up at every opportunity. The problem for everyone is that when he needs to poop, there can be a situation, as goose poop just doesn’t do anything good for his digestion. Witness the events this morning: I was, of course, in a rush, after having gotten everybody out the door, fed, equipped with lunch and homework, some of them even kissed (not Seth “I don’t need you for anything, mom” god, no), and I was just going to merrily run Thatcher around the block so he could pee and poop, then hie me to my therapist appointment (oh, my sainted therapist, I do love her so!).

I will spare you the details, but they included cancelling therapy and lots of bleach.

Although this little incident completely disrupted my morning plans, and although I hate to miss seeing my wise and loving therapist, I actually found myself in a rather jolly mood about it all. The dog really needed me. Then I really needed to clean up. Then I really needed to have a bowl of soup to sustain me. I was really being there now! Here. Whatever. And it felt pretty good.

I’m back on the go, now, and getting ready to head out again for more errands, more meetings. But I’ve had a bit of a rest, oddly, as the past hour has actually been quite rigorous physically. A rest in my head and spirit.

So, dear reader, off I go, and I will keep in mind the rousing words Huang Yu wrote on Tex’s herb container after she received the special ingredients she had to send away to China for:

ENJOY THE POOP!