The Yoni Chronicles: Season Finale

This will be—I hope—the last time I blather on about Things Gynecological, so bear with me for one final post on the topic.

Last week, my Abnormal Cells and I made a visit to our friendly neighborhood Uterinarian to take a spin on the Cervical Biopsy Wheel O'Fun.

I do the usual "undress from the waist down," which, honestly, is the weirdest part of the whole shebang for me. I actually feel less weird when they ask me to wear the drape with the why-does-this-even-have-ties because it seems more, I don't know, holistically awkward than wearing a cardigan and t-shirt and scarf on top and then nothing but overgrown leg hair on the bottom. I feel like one of those kids' flip books where the people/animals have a head and torso on the top pages and legs on the bottom pages, and you can make all kinds of silly combinations, like a yak with ostrich legs, which is what I feel like when I'm all winter-bear bundled up on top with no pants on. But at least they give me a giant paper towel to wrap up in. Because that's the same as clothes.

So there I am, with my super-absorbent mega-sheet of Bounty, waiting for the doc for a million, maybe two million, years when he finally bustles in and asks brightly if I'm ready to get started, like I'm taste-testing a new cola beverage as part of a focus group. I tell him that of course, it's all I've thought about all weekend long. He laughs nervously.

Then, of course, he proceeds to crank open the ol' baby oven and take a look, spritzing with vinegar and then waiting and spritzing some more. I feel like I'm being worked on by Manuel, Stylist to the Stars, and he's primping up the inside of my uterus. "This product is to add volume. Oh! Which you maybe don't need."

ANYWAY, Gyno-man explains that he can't see any Abnormal Cells, which is good, but that he wants to take "a little off the top" to make sure they aren't hiding out somewhere, you know, sneaking a cigarette or something. He whips out a scalpel and starts scraping and cutting like he's going to snort a line of coke right off the exam table. I'm sad to say that he did trot out the line that will forever make him a cliché in my book (however nice a cliché) about how I "may experience some cramping." I muse to myself that he's lucky that my "cramping" didn't take off some of his digits, what with my cervical musculature being so buff from the 83948753 kegels and all.

And then, suddenly, Lightning McOb-Gyn solidifies his reputation for the 2011 calendar year as Fastest Deliverer of Uncomfortable Procedures by announcing that he's done. He leaves the exam room, I guess because it would be so embarrassing to get dressed in front of someone who was just peering into my Part Where Babies Come From.

At this point, I attempt to divest myself of the remaining lube-and-vinegar mix (New snack flavor sensation! Try some today!). I now remember, as I always do at this part of the Down-Low Show, exactly why they gave me a napkin the size of Maryland to wear when I arrived, as it is the only thing large enough to take care of the "wintry mix" G-man has left behind. At last, I go skipping out of the office, cautiously buoyed by the fact that Gyno-man didn't have to get out the snatch stapler and get himself a nice pound o'flesh (ounce, pound, whatever).

And then, of course, I go home to wait, all the while swearing off soda and cookies and Chinese food and vowing to start exercising and drinking water and living on bran and mega-doses of Vitamin Good For Your Love-Canal. And then I go and have a few candy bars and cheeseburgers to take the edge off the stress.

Finally, The Call comes. As soon as Gyno-man's receptionist identifies herself, I say, more belligerently than I intend, "You better have good news for me." She's taken aback, but she laughs and says yes, actually, she does. She reports that there was no dysplasia (which I always thought was something Golden Retrievers get in their hips when they get old), and that I don't need to see G-Man for another six months.

All at once, it was like the last ten minutes of every Little House on the Prairie episode ever. You know, the 10 minutes that follows what my childhood best friend called "Cry Time," which is when Laura starts bawling because she's really sorry for rolling in the mud in her new pinafore, or Mary is weeping because she accidentally broke the vase Pa made for Ma, which, good God, give her a break, she's BLIND for Chrissake.

Anyway, after that, there's the dénouement where everyone forgives everyone else, and Pa reveals that he just finished a new vase for Ma anyway, and Ma feels so sorry for all the trouble that she gives the new vase to Mary, and Nelly shows up with a newer, prettier vase (which she pronounces "vahse"), and The Ingalls just hug each other and laugh at Nelly, who catches her bitter tears in her stupid new vahse.

It was like that, except what I did was announce to my co-worker that the Gates of Heaven did not need to be stripped and refinished after all, and we shared a knuckle bump through the cube walls.

It seems a bit of a flat ending—all that build-up just to say "Oh, just kidding—you didn't think you'd really end up having to get the innards of your Inside-Out frozen off, did you?" I imagine it's like going on a game show and getting to the $1,000,000 question and having them say, "Oh, heck, just take it. You're probably smarter than a fifth grader."

But I probably AM smarter than most fifth graders, so I am taking my prize money and my Just a Little Quirky cells and calling it a win.