American cancer society bracelet

LET ME TELL YOU WHAT HAPPENED WITH MY BREASTS TODAY. First, I spilled a latte all over them at the Coffee Bean U Tea Leaf. The lid on my cup wasn't tight, so when I went to take a sip, milk foam poured and then puddled on my sweater. Stooping to wipe up what I presumed would be a mess on the floor, I found that little coffee had gotten past me. For the first time ever, my breasts were too grande for my latte. * Later, I took my breasts out to lunch at the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica, where they promptly attracted the attention of, well, everybody. Outside the Broadway Deli, two men approached. They were well dressed, respectable-looking, and as they veered toward me, the one in the black designer suit leaned in, his eyes fixed like spotlights. "We love them," he announced, smiling wickedly. * I've had breasts for years. But now I have the biggest, firmest breasts in sight--a plump, jiggling set that obscure my downward vision and get in the way when I drive. My new breasts are D cup. They weigh 23.2 ounces--about the same as a couple of average grapefruits. They sit high on my chest in a bra that makes the most of my cleavage.

I've spent my whole life pretending breasts don't matter. Part of me still wants to believe it's true. I can make all the arguments, which basically come down to this: Women should be valued for their selves, not their shelves. Still, I have to admit, at the moment the breasts I'm toting feel like more than mere flesh. They feel like the source of all power.

THE PERFECTLY ROUNDED BREAST IS TO L.A. WHAT BIG hair is to Dallas. More than palm trees or surfboards or stars on Hollywood Boulevard, the breast--especially the surgically augmented breast--has become this city's icon. That it taps into an American obsession only makes the symbol more potent. Saline or silicone, globelike or teardrop, ta-tas put the la, la in Los Angeles.

Angelyne. Pamela Anderson. Melanie Griffith. These women have the kind of breasts that people associate with Southern California. Six breasts among them, and not one could be found in nature. Angelenos accept this. We joke about it. We exchange tips on how best to spot the fakes. One woman I know says U-shaped cleavage is the tip-off. Another studies breasts at the beach, searching for the telltale melon shape, the way certain implants defy gravity. It's a sport, and women here play it as much as men do.

Remember the scene in the movie L.A. Story when Steve Martin gropes Sarah Jessica Parker? He blanches, confused. "Your breasts feel weird," he says. "Oh" she replies, as if she's heard this before. "That's because they're real."

Then there's the Seinfeld episode when Kramer explains his expertise on the tactile properties of fake breasts by saying "I lived in L.A. for three months."

I know a producer of mega-action movies who once told a TV actress that she had the best real breasts he'd ever seen. Can there be another city on earth where someone, in a professional context, would say that out loud? The actress, eager to make the jump from TV to film, used to repeat the producer's assessment with pride. To be genuine in a city built on illusion is rare, and she hoped it would give her an advantage. The last movie she made went straight to video.

For women who work in Hollywood, the breast is as much about commerce as cosmetics. A memorable first impression is a necessity--one many actresses believe is worth paying $4,000 for. "It's a whole different world in L.A. than in the rest of the country," says Brian Cox, a Pasadena plastic surgeon who trained here, in the Northeast, and in the South. "In L.A. a lot of people see getting implants as a career move. They see it as a cost of doing business."

Nonactresses can't use that excuse. Yet everyone can relate to the insecurities of the flat-chested woman. What man hasn't worried about measuring up? Women, meanwhile, are so ruthless about their bodies that even the genetically fortunate find time to complain. Gwyneth Paltrow recently told Harper's Bazaar that she hates her butt. Helpfully, the magazine ran a nude portrait of the actress and said butt, which looked like it should be bronzed and put in a museum.

When it comes to beauty ideals and the self-loathing they inspire, however, breasts stand alone. I should know. For more than 20 years, I have been an A cup--just barely. In all that time I have never, not once, had a stranger stare at my chest. I've been admired, loved, lusted after. I've had my share of attention but not my share of breasts. As much as I want to deny it, it pisses me off. It is time, I decide, to stop traffic. It is time to join the ranks of the well endowed.

JULIA ROBERTS TO BE JUST ANOTHER PRETTY WOMAN. Now she's an Academy Award-winning actress. In between, things changed. Specifically, her breasts.

"It takes a village to create that cleavage." That's what Roberts said about her bustline in Erin Brockovich, the movie for which she won the Oscar. The village she was referring to was led by costume designer Jeffrey Kurland. Working with directors like Woody Allen and Neil Jordan, Kurland has designed women's undergarments for a variety of physiques, from Queen Latifah's to Robert Downey Jr.'s. For Brockovich he made Roberts's modest breasts look like two U-boats preparing to surface.

When I meet Kurland he is wearing jeans, a ponytail, and a silver bracelet on his wrist. He's just dropped off his six-year-old daughter at school. He laughs easily and seems to enjoy his work. So I ask him to build me some submarines of my own.

Kurland is intrigued by what he calls my "sociological experiment." "Very Margaret Mead-y," he says. He agrees to help me but issues a warning: "You're going to get a negative and a positive reaction, People don't tag girls with big breasts as rocket scientists." He predicts that I will begin to view myself differently, too. "You're going to look down," he says, "and see something you didn't see before."

I'm counting on it. I want to glimpse how the busty half lives. And maybe, finally, I'll get this damn monkey off my chest,

NUMBER OF MEMBERS OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons who work in California: 648. Number of states that have more ASPRS members than California: o. Number of members of the California Society of Plastic Surgeons who work in Los Angeles County: 114. Average number of CSPS members in California's 30 other counties that have members: 103. Number of women in the United States who underwent augmentation mammoplasty in 2000:212,500. Percentage of those performed in California: 22. Increase in the national number of breast augmentations since 1991:300 percent.

MY MOTHER NEVER TOOK ME BRA SHOPPING. SMALL breasted herself, not to mention free spirited, she didn't wear bras. She saw them as pointless, and during my teens, my body didn't do anything to convince her otherwise. Since then I've explored lingerie stores with curiosity and mystification but without much urgency.

Jeffrey Kurland needs building materials. He wants underwires with molded cups and wide, multihooked straps in back for support. He needs "half pads" "whole pads"--chicken cutlet-shaped pieces of foam with which to force me inward and create, for the first time, a valley where now there is a plain. In the intimates department at Bloomingdale's, I buy all these things. I buy bras with silicone inserts, with air-filled pillows, even with water balloons. I buy a B cup, a C cup, and one that promises to take me from a C to a D.

Since I last laid eyes on a padded bra, the technology has become outlandish. So has the language. There are "Sexy Fit" bras with removable "cookies," "[H.sub.2]O Smooth Water" demicups, "Liquid Kiss" bras, and the "Original Oxygen Lift" with "100% natural air." These things don't just make the most of what you've got. They treat you as the foundation upon which to add a couple of floors.

A lot of women see these breakthroughs as cause for rejoicing. I don't. In fact, I've always understood breast implants better than I understand the padded bra.

If big breasts really matter to you, a boob job delivers. To be sure, a woman who undergoes major--and from a health standpoint, unnecessary--surgery to enlarge her breasts is taking a risk. But what she gets for her pain and money is what our culture has encouraged her to want: a more Barbie-shaped body. The man or woman she lies down with will likely know that her big breasts weren't made by Mother Nature. But the illusion will be maintained, with clothes or without.

An Oxygen Lift Bra can't make that claim. What it can and does do is telegraph to its wearer and all who know her how much she desires big breasts, how much she thinks they matter, and how inadequate she feels not having them. In a padded bra, a night of passion devolves into a series of tactical maneuvers. I've never felt comfortable in a padded bra because it seems like the worst kind of lie: one that's sure to be discovered.