For those not in the know, Odontophobia is fear of teeth or dental surgeries/procedures.  I’m not really afraid of the dentist, but I’m generally afraid of teeth and all the things that go with them (bad breath, yellowness, cavities, stuff stuck in them). 

Here’s the deal. I loved the dental hygienist I used to see when we lived in the city. She was Russian, no-nonsense, and would frequently yell at her coworkers and mutter “Stupid Americans” under her breath.  I seriously loved her.  She was refreshing and unlike anyone else I knew, and she would always give it to me straight.  However, as the years passed (I’m not saying how many, but less than 5 and more than 1), I realized that driving down to her office was not likely to happen, given that it was 25 minutes away from my house.  When I took the girls in for their cleaning this year, I just sucked it up and made an appointment for myself.

I knew it wasn’t going to be very pleasant.  That’s what you get when you don’t go every 6 months - a lot of scraping and grinding and poking. However, my new (and very nice, albeit American) hygienist uses something new to me:  it’s the same Cap’n Hook instrument I’m used to, the thing that scrapes the gunk off your teeth, but hers vibrates and makes this horrible high-pitched whining sound as it dances all over your gumline.  A few times it literally felt like a white-hot pin stuck in my gum, vibrating its little heart to death. 

Then I heard her say, “Need to show you something.”

Egads. It’s never good when they stop scraping and blowing water into your throat long enough to pull out a mirror and bend your lips back over your head. 

Turn out I’d been missing a spot on number 27, whatever that is.  It’s one of my lower teeth.  Plaque had built up, and when she removed it, my gum had receded beneath it.  Then she said some scary words, ending in, “Mumble mumble give it six months and then we’ll see if you need a skin graft.”

Excuse me, Whaaaaa????  A skin graft?!?!  Yep, she pleasantly explained, flashing beautiful plaque-less teeth at me.  “We simply remove some skin from the roof of your mouth and stick it on the gum.” 

I started to dry heave.  She looked at my face and said, “Well, if you don’t want the skin removed from the roof of your mouth, we could always use donor tissue . . . “

Wow.  Nope.  Not interested in having random mouth tissue sewn into my gums, but thanks anyway. 

I have six months to brush it gently and floss a lot, and hopefully it will repair itself.  Believe me, if I ever needed motivation to floss, being told about “donor tissue” (*involuntarily shivering here*) is definitely the carrot in front of my horse. 

Other than that, I also found out I have an extra bone in the roof of my mouth, an extra cusp on one of my wisdom teeth, and no cavities.  I also had a lot of bleeding from all those silly bitewing x-rays that jabbed the heck out of my lower jaw.  Glad that’s over - for another 6 months at least.  Donor tissue.  Gag. 

The other day, I went to my other least favorite grocery store (Walmart is still in the number one position).  Food Lion, my neighborhood food store - or so they say.  We’ve called it the Food Poodle forever because the lion looks more like a . . . .well, you get the point.

No one was in the store.  It was mid-morning, and I had a few things.  One lone cashier stood at the end of her lane, thumbing through Star Magazine and looking supremely bored.  “Are you open?” I asked, knowing full well she was.  She sighed loudly and said, “Yep, right here”, gesturing at the lane.

I pulled all of my items out of the cart and she began to ring me up.  After the 4th item, a woman came up behind me.  The cashier suddenly looked stunned and said, “Oh, you can’t check out here.  This is Express Lane only,” and she points above my head at the sign.

Note:  I hate people who go through the Express Lane when they have more than 12 items.  However, it was an honest mistake. I apologized profusely to the woman behind me who laughed and said, “Seriously, it’s no big deal - just go ahead and finish her order.” 

The cashier, however, had other items.  She said, “I can’t, not allowed.  She started to push my items back into my cart while voiding things quickly.  She realized the cash register wouldn’t let her void my lone yogurt, so she called over the intercom for help in the Express Lane which was now the Slow Lane.  The lady behind me sighed and said again, “Really, I don’t mind - it would probably be faster for you to just ring her up.”  Oh, the wiseness of that woman!

Literally 5 minutes go by with me standing there watching my ice cream melt while the cashier mutters under her breath about the “deaf manager” and the lady behind me grows increasingly impatient.  We strike up a conversation about the Y (it was obvious we had both come from working out there).  Finally the manager shows, looks at my 13 items, and says, “You should just ring her up. There’s no point in making everyone wait.”

Yep. 

I’m facing the reality that the last year of my business life has not been, well, fabulous.  I’ve dealt with the reality that my beloved business partner now works for someone else, and the days of giggling and plotting and scheming and making money together are over.  I’ve also dealt with the humungo (yes, I know it’s not a word) impact that CPSIA is having and will have going forward.  I’ve dealt with the reality of our shite economy, but just barely.  I’m certainly not sitting on a pile of cash, cackling maniacally over my world domination of the onesie snapsuit world. 

I was having one of those great days, today, though.  I’ve been managing to pay cash for all of the nap mat inventory as I ramp up toward the infamous nap mat season.  I’ve been able to pay down our debt, even though I haven’t been able to pay me.  And all in all, things can only get better.  Or so I thought. 

About two years ago, we received a standard cease and desist letter from an agency on behalf of baby behemoth Gerber(tm).  It wasn’t even from a lawyer.  Neither Jennifer or I was too upset about it - we knew it was coming based on things we’d heard through the baby apparel grapevine.  Did you know that Gerber(tm) invented the onesie(tm)?  Yep, they did.  Some of our manufacturers are in the know and call them snappy terms like “snapsuit” or my personal unfavorite, “creeper”.  If you use the word onesie (TM!!! TM!!!) you must be sure that you are talking about a design on a genuine (TM) Gerber (TM) onesie (TMx140).  Unfortunately, when we started the company, we thought like marketers and not lawyers.  In other words, people searching online don’t usually search for “funny creepers” or “infant snapsuits”.  So, we named our company SassyOnesies.com. 

During the first round of worrying about the cease and desist letter, Jennifer called up an IP attorney she’d worked with at a local law firm.  He saw the letter and told us to remove the word “onesie (TM!!! this is getting old!)” from our site as a description.  We did.  We have over 500 products on there - it took QUITE a while.  His other advice, since all we were really worried about was them making us change the domain name, was to start stocking Gerber (TM) onesies (TM).  We did.  The theory being, if we actually carry GerberOnesiesTMTMTMTMTM we can theoretically call our site SassyOnesies.com.  Or so he thought. 

Fast forward to today, and my cease and desist letter from Gerber.  (You can read it here: Letter.pdf)

Now they are specifically stating we must change our domain name.  Good times!  The virtual cherry on my shit sundae!

I wrote back, but it won’t do anything.  I’m married to a lawyer; they laugh at emotion or pleading. 

My game plan is to call in a couple of favors to attorneys. I know I have a leg to stand on - you can make a case for terms that have become common vernacular language.  Most people don’t even know that there are other words for onesies (TM!) until you point it out to them.  And after years and years of owning the word, can we just all get along?  Can we share nicely?  Menacing Pickle (possibly the best name EVER) suggested that I’m possibly adding value to the onesie (TM) name by having high quality versions.  I’m not afraid to say that the majority of the SNAPSUITS we sell are thicker and softer than you-know-whos.  In that case, we’re giving them a GOOD name.  Fidget suggested one better - we change our logo, and name, to “Sass Yonesies”.  I’m pretty sure they would see through that one, but man did it make me giggle thinking about people trying to pronounce it!  My Michigan friend Christina suggested kicking Gerber’s butt.  My Minnesota friend Kristin suggested boycotting them, and snapsuit (no TM) manufacturer Mary Carter of Gifts of Wit suggested starting a “I hate Gerber” Facebook group.  She volunteered to be my first member.  I’m so glad I have all of their support because if nothing else, they made me laugh. 

If I cannot fight this, then the future is fairly clear.  I cannot afford to start up again under a new name and lose all of the search engine work we’ve done to this point. It’s cost us literally thousands (some of which we have yet to pay back) to get to the point we’re at.  I have a room full of inventory.  If we are forced to change domain names, SassyOnesies.com (TM!) will be closed.  I’ll be on the street, naked with a raincoat, whispering in a sultry voice, “Hey, WANNA BUY A CREEPER?” Don’t laugh.  It could happen. 

In the meantime, I am shaking my fist at the sky, at karma, at everything, and saying, “What the heck did I DO TO YOU???  COME ON!!!!” 

** Update:  Menacing Pickle, being a huge dork, found out that these phrases used to be TMd:  yo-yo, mimeograph, crockpot, kerosene, heroin, linoleum, trampoline, dry ice, pilates, cellophane nylon, thermos, escalator and aspirin. 

circa 1983.  First month of Junior High.  I’m wearing a pair of gray corduroy pants, gray and pink argyle socks, and a matching gray and pink argyle sweater.  My hair is too short for my face, and it has the remnants of a bad perm hanging on to it.  I haven’t rocked my braces yet, so I’ve got a mouthful of teeth and a too-big smile.  I walk to the end of the bus ramp and see my friend from elementary and middle school, standing with a group of girls I recognize, but don’t know. 

My friend, E, has long blond hair, bright blue eyes and is wearing acid-washed jeans and a tight, neon-colored sweater.  She has a scarf draped casually around her neck, but no coat, because only nerds and dweebs wear coats, even in Northern Michigan, even in October. 

I walk up to her, anxious to catch up.  Since we started here, I rarely see E.  She’s got a new group of friends. They all chew a lot of gum, have large, teased bangs, and need lubrication to slide into their jeans every morning.  They are my age, but they look like they are 10 years older.  They’re a little mean, too.  Even the one that needs a nose job was sneering at a nerdy girl earlier that week in the bathroom for not wearing lipstick. 

E sees me out of the corner of her eye, and she starts to panic. I nearly stop walking. I can see her breathing increasing, her eyes darting around the group of gum-snapping girls.  I say hello, and she recoils like I slapped her.  She moves out of the circle and talks briefly with me, tells me she’ll call me, tell me she’s been busy.  If it wouldn’t be too obvious, she’d be making those shooing hand motions my mom makes at the dog when she’s underfoot.  I nod my head, my big, toothy smile way out of whack with my eyes.  Before I know it, E is back in the fold, and like a wave, the circle of Juicy Fruit-scented girls closes peacefully in front of me. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

circa 2009.  Junior High has followed me into my late 30’s.  The groups are different, the jeans are much the same.  The teased bangs have given way to coiffed blonde bobs and cute exercise gear.  There is a lot of Vera Wang instead of Gasoline.  There is 7 instead of Gloria Vanderbilt.  The legs are longer, the lips fuller, the jewelry much better, more expensive.  The big diamonds have a glittering fist-fight with each other whenever the sun comes out on the street.  And even now, sometimes there is still rapid eye-movement, hair-flicking, and nervous breathing when I approach the “popular girls”.  Sometimes the look in their eyes makes me feel like speaking to me is painful.  I pull out my big grin again and act completely clueless about it.  I ask how their kids are, by name.  I remember who had a game last week, and what the name of her team was.  I ask for the results.  Someone asks about weekend weather, I whip out my iPhone and look it up for them.  On the days when even their most basic manners are not functioning, and they stand across the street from me in a big gaggle of Popular Girl Version 2.0, I still smile.  I read my mail and I wait for my task to be completed.  I wait, and refuse to be cowed like I was in Junior High. There is no bathroom to hide during breaks, there is no uncool table of people in the cafeteria.  There is just me, at 37, really quite irritated that these old feelings still can be brought up.  Could I still be wearing the wrong thing, asking the wrong questions, and could I still really even give a shit? 

It is a grand testimony to the meanness of girls, and the trauma that we all do to each other growing up, that years later we are still chafing under that uncomfortable stare. I think back at my past - I try to see clearly - and I can remember all the mean things I did to girls that were my friends, and the mean things I did to those that weren’t.  For me, it was justified. It was vindication. To finally have my own gum-snapping posse of like-minded individuals, well, that was just too good to pass up.  After years of mental beatings from girls wearing too much Love’s Baby Soft, I was ready to beat back.  Shifting BFFs every other Monday, isolating or ridiculing the person in the group that had fallen out of favor - hoping that this month, the falling-out-of-favor would happen to someone else.  Usually it did. 

It’s the Chicken or the Egg.  Was I mean to other girls because so many had been mean to me prior?  How can groups of women do two totally different things to me?  First thought, my groups of friends now are the warm landing spot in my life, the place I go when I need laughter or support or a drink.  Second thought, those “other” women, who are just as bad (if not worse, because they should SO know better by now) who flick their moods off and on like a light switch, say mean things, posture and strut, and laugh when you fall down.

There is one difference.  I handle the big bad girls differently.  I chirp cheerfully in the street, or the hallways of the Y.  I smile even when I feel like kicking them in their bobbed heads.  I ask polite questions even if I don’t care to hear the answers.  And I politely ignore their discomfort at my close proximity to them, as if by standing near me, they will end up with my body, or my fashion sense, or god forbid, my non-Vera-Wang purse-carrying hand. 

One of my dad’s favorite expressions fits oh-so-well with snow days.  This being my first year of life with a child in public school, I have already been indoctrinated on every holiday that must be celebrated by closing school, plus the constant “teacher work days”, “teacher inservice” and “teacher really needs a break from your bratty kids day” (that one I actually agree with).  Since the bulk of my youth was spent in Traverse City, the land of snow and gray skies, I associate snow days with pure, unadulterated joy.  Primarily because snow days in Northern Michigan are R-A-R-E. 

Now, though - not so much.  It is now Tuesday evening and tomorrow is yet another day the school will be closed “due to inclement weather”.  Mentioning again at the risk of being annoying that I am from Traverse City, the land where a snow day was NEVER called unless people were literally dying in their cars, buried alive in the 20 feet of snow that fell in a 2 hour period of time, combined with temps of -20 below, I have little tolerance for what snow days in Virginia mean.  The roads are clear and dry, but there’s a chance that some side road might have some crusty white stuff on it and someone might slip.  OH MY GOD CANCEL SCHOOL. 

Yeah, I’m bitter.

Which leads me to my analogy.  My dad has a saying.  In this case, it goes something like this.  “Snow days are like boobs.  One is not enough, and three is way too many.”  The original phrase inserts the word “Stinger” for “Snow Day”, one of his favorite drinks that my mom swears makes him “mean”. 

Three is way too many. The kids are cuckoo, there are no movies out they haven’t seen, we’re all tired of playing the snow, I spent $268 at the vet today so the expendable cash is a little low, and, according to my mom, too much tv causes asthma in kids.  Is that a wheeze I hear from upstairs?  I think it is.  God help me, they’ll probably cancel school on Thursday if all the snow doesn’t melt tomorrow.  Someone send me alcohol, and fast.  Someone also send me a rapid-acting inhaler for my children, because that asthma is a-comin’. 

More pictures are up on the March 2009 Snowstorm Extravaganza.