Monday, October 22, 2007

cleavage creek

I didn't get out of my pajamas until three o'clock in the afternoon yesterday. I was a little hung over. I saw a concert in the city the night before. I stayed out too late, drank too much, talked too much, maybe smoked a cigarette, definitely inhaled a lot of secondhand pot smoke. I'd watched two hourlong biographies---Reese Witherspoon and LeAnn Rimes---before noon.

I'm just setting up context for my mood here. Cause when I flipped the channel to the local news and saw this segment on Cleavage Creek Cellars I felt confused. My thoughts were forming too slowly, my judgment questionable. This is a winery up in Pope Valley, California. They've got a cool mission. The man who owns it lost his wife to breast cancer, and so he's developed this wine label to honor breast cancer survivors.

The thing is, as awesome as the concept and the awareness-building are, the name and the labels are creepy. Check out the website. And then there's this news guy who can barely contain his enthusiasm. He gets to talk about boobs, to boobs. He's talking to one of the models, saying things like, "Well, look at you on this label. You look absolutely gorgeous." And "You'll always have this label as a reminder of how beautiful you look." And yes, and no, and this is where my overindulgence from the night before was starting to cloud my thinking. I felt alternately like I should be supportive of this, and like something was so off. The women of Cleavage Creek bear their cleavage, and they have every right. And good for them! Be honored. Dress up and have your decolletage out there for the world to partake from---literally. It's good. Busts are sexy. But then, I don't know. There's an edge of Stepfordness to it, a little something about the glamour shots that makes me squirm. They're celebrating life and wine, and they look like they're gueststarring on next week's episode of "Desperate Housewives."

I'm going to ask The Boob Lady, our resident boob expert, what she thinks. Her book, bOObs: a guide to your girls is out, by the way. It's true that we can never get enough of boobs. And October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. So I'm glad for the segment on Cleavage Creek, but you know, simultaneously a teensy bit disturbed.

---Brooke

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Regarding the post about Cleavage Creek Winery - I would feel better about the concept if they were featuring not only the cleavage of some perky-breasted 20-somethings, but also the cleavage of older women, and women of all sizes, shapes, and colors.

Regina DeFalco Lippert