Keep my feathers numbered

I am so congested, and I’m ripping open my shirt to see the hole where my heart used to be, and that’s fine, but I look closely and I see there’s a huge bunch of feathers stuffed inside and I don’t like the confusion of that.
I pull out the larger ones, and see that it’s starting to look pretty, so I start moving everything around this way and that, realizing hey, this is a lot like arranging flowers in a vase!

You probably know what’s going to happen next. I drop to my knees, utter a short prayer, and roll over to a pilates stance. For what I am about to receive, I say, it’s a joke, son!

I almost pulled out feather number two.
Do you remember that part of Heartburn by Nora Ephron, at the end of the book, where she’s at the dinner table assessing love and life and everything else, and the key lime pie in front of her starts to throb? And she feels she has to throw it at her soon to be ex-husband to break her internal tension?
I sort of wish she’d been able to eat a piece of that pie first before tossing it into his beard, although I admit that was a pretty theatrical gesture.

number 1. (it was stamped on the side. Small print.) There was a slight hissing, then nothing. I put it back in. Pulling it out a second time would be easier. No fear! Trichotillomania for the summer, thought Leptis.

If it’s going to be a cold winter, I should be thinking of being a self-made duvet. It would be the ultimate in recycling and home comfort. Best of all, it’s organic!