Twenty-two pounds

It's that time of year again:  mammogram!

Always something unsettling about having a total stranger manhandle what is considered to be a fairly intimate part of one's anatomy.

This year, there was an interesting distraction:  the mammography machine had a small digital gauge built into it, registering pounds. Pounds of what?  (I wonder how much an individual breast weighs?) It was not a mass-related measurement, however:  it was a pressure measurement.  As the technician tightened the compression plate, the numbers went up, up, UP, and then stabilized.

Twenty-two pounds is a lot of pressure.  "Don't move now." As if a person could move very far anyway.

:::flinch:::

The mammogram was mercifully brief, as always.  Fingers crossed that we're all done for another year.