anyone want some old bras?

I confronted a demon today. A big, bosomy, beige demon with a Brooklyn accent. My excessively sweet and accomodating friend Claire and I were wandering around Soho / the Lower East Side when I realized I was in the neighborhood of my demon and I should just face the damn thing and be done with it. I didn't know its address, of course, but after a while, we found it: right on Orchard Street, where it's supposed to be.

The store has a serious reputation for women with serious endowments, and my friends, I am endowed like Harvard University. Like Harvard and Yale PUT TOGETHER and there's nothing I can do about it, except find undergarments that fit right. I have a drawer full of old standards that don't quite do it, so I figured it was about time to square my shoulders, narrow my eyes, and get fitted by the experts.

Naturally, as soon as the expert approached me, eying the figure I keep well-hidden under my coat, I shrieked, "I know what size I am!" They keep tranquilizers on hand for just such occasions. The expert, an ageless Jewish lady watching soaps on a small TV, cooed to me, "Don't worry, sweetheart. No one grows in this store." I've been waiting for those words my whole life.

From a wall of floor-to-ceiling boxes she selected one marked with the measurements and the brand I gave her (Wacoal, baby, for which tip I must credit La Bitch) and displayed its contents. "This one's the best," she said. "This one?" I asked, holding up another. "No," she said firmly. "This one."

I am a sucker for experts. Dutifully, I took the bra she recommended and followed her down the narrow middle aisle past a heavy Hasidic man and a dark-skinned woman in a turban. She stopped at no place in particular and pulled a curtain to separate us from the store. Once she'd coaxed me out of my shirt, she nodded and smiled. "Mamaleh," she said, "you're wearing the wrong size."

"No!" I cried. It was my worst fear come true. But she hasn't been a bra saleslady for 21 years for nothing. She spun my new measurements to mean that I was thinner than I thought, and what could be wrong with that? Besides, the proof would be in the pudding. She brought me a different bra, which I slipped on, and -- well, wow. I looked smaller, smoother. My back felt different. She pronounced me perfect, then insisted we go out and show Claire.

Claire, who is a trooper, nodded excitedly at my chest and tried to say supportive but not creepy things about what was displayed there. The saleslady beamed. The bras were on sale for half off, and the decision was made. The key takeaway? I'm thinner that I thought.