Pricks and Needles.

“You know, every year I like you a little less.”

“That’s funny. Every year, I like you a little more.”

Really, they should do something about the ceilings, given their relative importance. Mirrors and elegant photography grace the walls, classic woven baskets have replaced clinical trash bins and Kelly Clarkson is piping through the halls.

And a sea of clinically white ceiling panels that I have been staring at for the last half hour.

It’s like déjà vu, all over again.

How I ended up on a schedule that aligned my birthday with that annual pilgrimage into the stirrups that all women dread, I do not know. But here I am once again celebrating the passing of another year, feet up high and covered in a flimsy paper sheet and a gown that covers absolutely nothing. I don’t even know why I bother, considering that my right breast stubbornly refuses to stay tucked away and I’m so cold my nipples could cut glass.

I genuinely like my doctor, I really do. She’s my age, understands what it is like to have a daughter that makes the Godfather look like a bedtime story, and balances the demands of a career against the desire for normalcy and motherhood. She’s watched me go from top to bottom and top again, and all along the way I have never felt judged or ashamed of my frailties.

But the last three visits have sent me home with deep sea diving expeditions that required sedation, stitches, hours suffering the effects of a not-to-be-taken-lightly concoction with the innocuous name “GoLytely” and a series of uncomfortable follow up visits. I’ve been poked, prodded, pried, pricked and probed.

None of it according to my specifications.

“Any issues?”

“Define issues … ?”

I have plenty of issues. But how I answer this is important because there are issues and then there are issues. And then there are issues that send me off to have my bowels excavated. Or issues that cause a fistful of stitches in Mommy’s happy place.

“Any lumps?”

Yes. None of which I am happy about. Metal clinks and wrappers crackle and the light burning a hole in my nether regions is finally and thankfully whisked away, only to be replaced by a less-than-gentle indignity and inspection.

“You know, that is far less enjoyable coming from you.”

And with that, the tires have been rotated, the oil has been checked and the motor has been revved. My resale value remains, I am told, quite high.

But just in case, she’s arranged for a little gift. Another interlude in Brumhilda’s body squishing torture chamber and enough lab work to feed the cast of True Blood for an entire year.

“Happy Birthday!”

Only if I close my eyes and pretend that you are Gerard Butler.