My father gave me a Victoria’s Secret gift card for Christmas, which is weird on many levels. Firstly, it’s not like him: his Christmas gift to me last year was a set of two power drills, and the year before that it was a Dremel and a pocket-knife from the Army surplus store. (I wonder if he didn’t confuse his gifts and my sister is somewhere with a Craftsman 4-way convertible screwdriver with magnetic head thinking “…the hell?”). Secondly, it’s not like me: it’s all very PINK and sparkly and confusing in there. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it, I just don’t get it. I do not, as the store would seem to imply, feel Sexy if I slap some lace over my girl parts. I mostly just feel itchy. But I was told that a properly-fitted bra would Change My Life, and so I found myself last weekend, hovering nervously at the entrance to the Victoria’s Secret at my local mall, screwing up my courage to take the plunge and grow up and become a Real (Pink) Girl.  At left: NOT ME.

Once inside, I wandered amongst the dizzying array of foundation garments, wondering where the hell to even begin. I had no idea bras could do so many different things. The ones over here would lift and support, the ones over there would push things up, the ones on the rack squeezed things together, the ones on the wall would conform to your unique curves like an angel’s whisper (or something very poetic like that). There were demicups and racerbacks and convertibles and air-filled breast enhancers. Several had frills or bows or baubles of some sort attached…there was even a model with pearl straps, like, how practical is that, really? What’s the point? I suppose it was meant to be worn exclusively without an outer garment, in order to prance about in front of the boy or girl of your choice and provide titillation for them and possibly initiate sex or at least heavy petting. Which ain’t happening, here. I am far too old and lumpy for that nonsense. If I am down to my underwear in front of someone, the lights are most likely off and it’s a very temporary situation, a seconds-long stepping stone on the path to total nudity and getting down to business before he can change his mind.

ANYWAY. At least I could cross that possibility of my list. But there was still an overwhelming number of choices and variations and sizes, and my confusion must have been evident because “Can I help you?” chirped a voice behind me and I turned to see a store employee with a razor-cut bob and an “I work on commission” smile standing there.

“I’d like a bra which hides my nipples while simultaneously making it look like there are actual visible breasts behind them,” I said.

Not really. I might have wanted to, but I was kind of scared of the spiky pretty girl. I mumbled awkwardly about sizes and Craftsman screwdrivers and needing help maybe and made a few vague “my breasts are here” gestures at my chest. Luckily, employees of Victoria’s Secret are apparently trained to work with the hopeless and she guided me into the back where she took various further embarrassing measurements of my body and proclaimed me a “32C”.

HAHAHAHAHAHA.

Okay, I don’t know a lot about fancy girly underwear. But I do know that C is the third letter of the alphabet, and sizes of bras go upwards from A, and being a C would mean there’s two, possibly three (if you count the double-As) subsets of female humanity walking around this earth with smaller breasts than mine. Which: NO. I have mockingly been compared to various flat items like pancakes and Kansas. I buy my button down Oxford-type shirts in the boys’ department because the curvy ladies-type ones don’t fit me. I can easily buy bras that come in boxes with a picture of a delighted teenage girl on the front and the words “My first!” somewhere on the graphic. C?! I do not think so. What manner of nonsense was this?

But Ms. Aggressively Cheerful seemed very sure of herself, and she was the professional, so I waited patiently while she fetched a bunch of these 32Cs to try on.

Naturally, none of them worked. But oddly, all failed for different reasons. Falling straps, weird bunching, gaps in the front, gaps on the top, over-tightness on the sides squeezing lumpy fat pockets out around the edges…I mean, I am no stick-skinny actress on 90210 or anything, but I’m not normally plagued by an overabundance of fat pockets. Boo, bra!

I tried to show this to her, a mortifying event in itself. Standing there shirtless being examined by a pretty girl? NO FUN. Even when she’s assuring you it fits “great!”. So I finally out and out begged for a different size and she suggested a 34B, because “It’s the same thing anyway”. Brrrrt? So why label them as different sizes, or have different sizes at all, or - oh, never mind. Bring on the next round of torment, please.

A phalanx of new bras appeared, an assortment of cotton, lace, and ribbon slid under my door at regular intervals, my despair growing with each ill-fitting one. By this point I was feeling mighty guilty for taking up so much of the spiky pretty girl’s time, but I was equally certain I was not going to find anything that worked. Barring any foundation-garment related miracles, of course. Is there a Catholic patron saint for this sort of thing? (First person to say St. Jude gets kicked.)

I began looking for a secret exit. Maybe a trapdoor to a set of tunnels leading out of the mall, a sort of Underground Railroad for the hopelessly un-girly. Alas, there was none, and so I finally feigned delight over one of them - the Sexy Cotton Fairy model, I think - said I would meet her up at the checkout, and as soon as I was out of her sight I stuffed it in the nearest drawer and furtively fled out of there as fast as possible, trailing shame and rhinestones the entire way.

And thus ended my adventure in that very pink place - no Angel am I, and I’m sure Victoria herself would be quite cross with my shameful, clandestine egress. So what did I learn?

1. I am clearly misshapen and my body doesn’t belong in any garments that are created for proper females.

2. Being a girl is complicated. I was far better at deriving equations to model atmospheric motion than I am at unraveling the mysteries of bra sizing. I FAIL. My father is getting married in a couple weeks and I must go out this weekend and purchase something for the occasion called a “dress”. Also, “mascara”. Wish me luck…