Girl vs. Island: Jellyfish Versus Vagina

I am here to tell you that sea glass hunting may be harmful to your vagina.

Sea glass hunting is the hobby that keeps me from turning into a creepy Stephen King novelist character who stays in a dark cottage office all day and night, the only sound the clicking of the keyboard, drinking single malt Scotch and smoking Marlboros.*

You could say I’ve become addicted to sea glass hunting. In addition to a sea glass Pinterest board, I have an app on my iPad that tells me when low tide is every day, and I also have collected a metric shit ton of sea glass in every size, shape and color. The cottage owners are making a table out of sea glass, I think as a way to help me avoid starring in an episode of Extreme Hoarders: The Sea Glass Edition.

Ok, so this weekend I was on my usual low tide sea glass bike run. The tide was especially low, and a sunken island was visible for the first time I’ve seen this summer. In my water shoes, and wearing a knee-length orange dress and no panties**, I waded out to the lost island. I saw jellyfish, but was able to avoid them. Bummed to discover that whole island was covered in oyster shells and silt, I waded back to my usual (super secret) sea glass hunting spot. Erosion and the rising tide have eradicated all the beaches around the island where I hunt. All that remain are a handful of semi-sandy, oyster-shell-covered patches amidst the phragmites. It is here (especially where the island used to dump its trash) that I’ve found all the rarest colors of sea glass: red, purple, yellow, pink. And my new favorite thing: sea pottery. Really neat 18th century plate pieces, blah blah blah I’ll tell you more about the sea glass later, because I just bought the url for a new hobby sea glass blog I’m going to start.

Anyhoo, I normally hunt for sea glass on this particular beach (because there is so much) in basically a downward-facing-dog yoga pose. Legs apart, hands on the sand. Sometimes I do a squat thing if I need to see something more closely. Did I mention there are huge, scary, pulsating, foot-long-tentacled jellyfish all over the fucking Chesapeake Bay? Because there are. Millions of them.

Standing about calf-deep in the water, I apparently chose to squat directly over a jellyfish and, what with the whole commando thing, I basically was unknowingly having sex with this disgusting sea creature from hell. The way I found out I was getting raped by jellyfish tentacles was that I felt an unimaginable stinging sensation (sort of similar to the time I didn’t read the directions on a certain hair removal product) in my lady bits.

The Burning Bush. Again. What is it about not burning the living crap out of my vajayjay that I can’t seem to figure out in this life?

I did what any woman with a smoking hot hoo-hah would do when she’s just been violated by Squidward. I screamed at the top of my lungs. And then I kicked him. It’s hard to kick something when you and the thing are both in water, but I sort of took my pink water shoe and like spite-kicked him. I do not know if it hurt him. Also, I am pretty sure I heard laughter coming from the other jellyfish.

I had little time for spite, though, because I needed to attend to my bearded clam which lost its sea battle with the Devil’s Island castaway jellyfish from hell.

I immediately remembered hearing the two most commonly prescribed remedies for jellyfish stings: pee and sand. I had heard at differing times that neither worked, but this was definitely a good time to scientifically test out both potential cures.

The only convenient thing about getting stung in the vag by a jellyfish is that if you’re going to pee on it, the pain is conveniently close to the cure. So, looking around to see how many people have come out to their docks to watch this little bay-front freakshow, I squat again (and probably for the last time over bay water, I gotta say) and sort of try to pretend I’m looking for sea glass when really what I’m doing is simultaneously trying not to get pee on my orange dress while I’m peeing in a sort of circular motion to get as much pee as I can on the sting area.

Gotta say? It did seem to help. For a second. Then, more burning. I decide I have to get in the water, fuck the dress, so I just sort of start splashing around like a deranged woman or retarded seal. Then, I think: sand. There isn’t really a lot of sand to be found, and I start thinking that if I cram handfuls of sand around my wounded waffle, I may be peeing out shrapnel for like a week. I skip the sand, choosing to high-tail my stung ass home for a cold shower. Really cold.

I believe from now on I shall sea glass hunt with more caution, keep my Spongebob inside some Squarepants and stay the hell away from rapey Squidwards.

*actually that whole scenario just sounded really awesome….

**I’m commando. Always. TMI?

Comments

comments