Ten year old pillows...

My friend J has amazing breasts...

Seriously - she does. Her man would more than likely concur with me about this, and Pootle, J and I discussed this recently as she is considering having a breast reduction...

"Why on earth would you want to do that?" I ask her, inevitably over a coffee.
"They are too big." She moans and looks down at them just to check they still are as she remembers.
'They are quite amazing though...I confess to being a little bit envious of them." I tell her, and for a brief while all three of us stare at her breasts trying to take in the greatness of them..."and a little scared of them too." I add.

They are very big.
"You see?" She reiterates her point, "Too big."
"Can breasts be too big?" says Pootle.
We shrug...size is relevant to the person I suppose.
"They can certainly be too small." I say, and everyone stops starting at J's breasts and look at mine. "At least you have plumpness and cushion like ability...in fact they are pretty much top of the range pillows; like memory foam." I add.
J preens herself a little hearing this news.

Pootle herself also has excellent Silent Night types and between her and J, I can't imagine you wouldn't get a good night sleep on those puppies.

Mine however would probably give you a head ache...

"Oh, yours aren't that bad." Says Pootle, "If you pushed them together they could make a pillow of sorts; like an old favourite pillow that you have to fold over," and she kind of demonstrates this with her hands in front of her...
J nods in agreement, "Yeah, like a ten year old pillow that has lost 'featherage'. But you are still quite fond if it."
"...that has lost its stuffing and is a bit stained and flat." Pootle continues.
"Girls," I look at them, "please don't hold back. Tell it like it is."

The thing is they are right, however, we can't all have memory foam and we can't all have the body of David Beckham or Kelly Brook...it doesn't work like that in real life, yet there is an expectation on the dating scene that anything less than perfect (in our eyes) is not on our list to try.

Someone said to me recently that they couldn't go out with a female who was anything but slim; that is fine as most of us have a criteria of what we find attractive initially...however, are we being too picky? Are we missing out on the voluptuous femme fatale on the other side of the room just because of our preconceived ideas about what we want?

I have dated in the past both men who are slim and men who are on the larger side...it wasn't that that specifically attracted me to them. It was what they had to say. But the trouble with getting older is that we are using our experiences to tell us what we really don't want, therefore some potentials are being missed out on our radar purely because they are a few pounds heavier...or their face is too thin.

What am I trying to say here?

I suppose there is an element of us that wants the whole package; the looks, the conversation, the banter...the thunderbolt; but what I am learning is that the thunderbolt doesn't normally mean long term.

Meeting someone who has the ability to reduce you to talking b**locks on a first date, doesn't necessarily mean they have the ability to hold your attention span once they start talking...whilst someone who doesn't create fireworks initially, may just ignite a spark once you start getting to know them and may be longer lasting.

Meeting a man who is shy may well put me off...however, I could be walking away from someone who once I got to know actually has a great deal to say, but I never gave them the chance.

Certainly a few of my friends would agree. When they met their partners there wasn't a thunderbolt; there wasn't a firework display behind their retinas...but with time, they became attracted to them and accepted them for who they were...warts and all....

Now, they wouldn't change them for the world...including their ten year old pillows...