I'm in shock

Seriously rattled.

I made the monthly trek to town yesterday, lunch with buddies, pharmacy-grocery-beer-gas-chicken-food shopping, and dragged my tired old butt home.

Em, Richard and Liam (with a pumpkin cheesecake) were here to celebrate C.'s birthday, and they'd brought two loads of wood from a neighbor of my garden-club friends. It was awesome. R. unloaded the wood, and the car. Em made dinner. Liam and I read in the big recliner.

Then I helped Em deliver plates of cheesecake and the GF carrot cake I'd made yesterday, discovered I was without my cane while I crossed the kitchen holding two plates of cake, and in ominous slo-mo,  windmilling, fell backward onto my butt on hardwood floor. Richard lunged to catch me and managed to save one plate, but not me. Boom.

Nothing was broken, not even me. I hurt some, and I'll be taking it easy for a few days. The shocking part came when I checked in the bathroom mirror for a bruise.

Sometime in the last 30 years, something has happened to my ass. Now, I've lost weight in the last year,  thanks to my doc's ban of gluten. Maybe six belt notches. I don't pay much attention – after all, I'm in here, not out there. I don't look in mirrors much. (Who knows how many times I appeared at work with my hair sticking up, or tags on the outside? I don't. I have kind friends.) And I've gotten old – 59 at last count.

This morning I met my butt face-to-face. Or face-to... you know what I mean.

And I'm still reeling. (Mentally, I mean. Though if I forget the cane and am tired, physically, too.) Where there should be a robust bumper of butt cheek, there is a... sort of saggy hollow. And the cheek bit is a shriveled thing, way down there. Whoa.

What happened?

I'm going to go sit on the heating pad now, and read some escapist fiction.

Do they make helmets for the butt? Or do I have to wear my old fanny pack backward?