True Confessions: I have B.O.

I can remember having an issue with B.O. since I was about age 9.  Right around the time my dear mother made a comment about my odor - in public, in front of me and my new track team - after we had just won our first relay race, and I was the anchor leg who had brought it home strong.

"Wow!" my mother exclaimed, with pride beaming all over her face.  "I think this is the first time I have ever smelled you, Mo!"

As you can imagine,  I was mortified.  There, out in public, in front of god and everybody, she outed me. 

Since then, I have suffered much and gone to great lengths to hide my B.O. problem from others, including wearing a down parka nearly every day of middle school (including the 80 degree spring days) to hide my underarm stains.  Of course, by the time I got home, the stain was three times as large as it would have been had  I NOT worn the down parka in 80 degree weather.  Not to mention, I had successfully managed to stifle my body's natural detoxification process for the last 8 hours, but no one was the wiser, and that was what was important.

Now, as an adult, I am slowly starting to surrender the idea that I need to hide my B.O.  Surrender: its a funny thing.  It really is a LOT like "giving up" something you have absolutely NO control over to whomever/whatever does have control.  I have very little control of how much I sweat and how it smells, and it has taken me damn near 37 years to start letting go if the idea that I do.  And flop sweat is the absolute worst!  The more nervous I get, the more it smells, and the more it smells, the more nervous I get.  One of the endless negative feedback loops that demands your surrender if you want to see results. 

Today is a new day.  I am here, at 9:16 in the a.m. in my robe.  I smell myself.  Its OK.  And I will go about my day, and at some point, I will indeed get ripe.  And it will be up to me whether I choose to let that bother me, or I choose to let it go and risk offending someone with my natural smells. It could go either way, really, but since I plan on doing some serious dancing tonight,  I would like to be granted an extra dose of grace on the dance floor so that I may express my self in all my odiferous splendour. Ja - I will let you know how it goes.

Happy Saturday Friends, Family and Strangers!  Make it a good one!