It was not a term she was unfamiliar with – anomaly. She had heard it many times in a sociology class she had taken in college. “That doesn’t count. That group is an anomaly,” the professor said. It didn’t really seem fair to her to discount an entire group of people because they were “anomalies.”
“An anomaly that represents over ten percent of the whole population?” she argued back. “Should they be discounted because they are gay?”
She wasn’t afraid to question authority, so she wrote her term paper on The Culture of Gays based on her own research and observations. She made the argument that gays were every bit as normal as straights with jobs, families, and relationships. The professor didn’t agree and gave her a C-.
Many years later when a TSA agent made her walk through the x-ray machine a second time and felt her up real good between the legs, and then remarked, “You have an anomaly between your legs in the upper thigh area.”
She went into comedy mode, laughing and joking, “Of course, I do!” she began to defend herself with her usual bawdy humor.
The TSA agent looked at her in all seriousness, and said, “Do you have something stuffed up there?”
“Yes, I have a lot of stuff stuffed up there,” she laughed naturally.
“You do?” The agent was getting testy.
“Yes, I do! It’s called fat!” Both she and the agent broke into laughter simultaneously. The agent seemed relieved, but Kristie was tempted to continue her one woman show. She thought better of it when she was urged forward by others in her party.
“I was just about to ask the agent if she wanted to feel it again?” Never one to let the jokes run short,”It feels like a boob with no nipple, so soft and squishy…my inner thigh! Ha! Ha!” She laughed to herself.
Later in re-telling the story she thought better about the possible outcome of joking with a TSA agent. Not a good idea. Next time she would play it straight and try not to be an anomaly.
(First published 12/11/13)
