Words for My Enjoyment

Today’s Prognosis on Sweating

October 17th, 2005

Never let them see you sweat.

It’s a phrase that we have heard from the dawn of time (except for the “real” dawn of time when I suspect that it was something more like, “Never let them see you wet” cause there’s nothing worse than a wet caveperson — I mean, you’re not showering in the first place and THEN you get wet?) Cavepeople seeing another caveperson who was totally wet from afar would probably think something like, oh god do I really even want to be near someone that LOOKS that smelly… Of course, they thought it in a less than sentencey structure if you know what I mean.

But for us, normal civilized people, we are faced with the horror of sweating in public and the fallout on a daily basis.

Going to a meeting. Doing a presentation? Performing on stage? Going on a date? There are millions of events that we’re involved with where only one major thing can affect our mindset and the mindset of those watching or participating with us. And that one thing is the under-arm sweat mark.

There is a science of course to the under-arm sweat mark. There are certain fabrics and colors that do not allow the sweat mark to appear. There are ways to double up on undershirts or shoot your underarms up with Botox to prevent such sweating. There are deoderants now available on the market that basically kill all the sweat glands so that you will never again sweat from that area (of course, you sweat from your fingertips instead cause the sweat has to go somewhere).

But I have found that there is a much more worthwhile solution to the under-arm sweat mark than coordinating some elaborate Rube Goldberg clothing contraption combined with drugs just to stop the sweating from happening. Instead, I suggest developing really elaborate excuses for your under-arm sweat and incorporating the sweat into your presentations as if you planned it all along!

Yes. A pure stroke of staggering genius.

For example. Work in real estate? Doing a presentation about your real estate market and how houses are selling faster and for more money than ever before? Well, make your under-arm sweat the star of your speech!

“Oh my gosh, do you see the sweat here under my arms? Do you see how the circles of sweat grow larger and larger with each word I speak? This is just how the American public is feeling right now, racing around neighborhoods trying to find a house to bid on and a house to buy. Do you see the glistening liquid growing and darkening by the seconds!? Just like the prices in the current market, growing, increasing and inconveniencing the American public to a point where it’s a complete, frustrating annoyance… Like this sweat. I’d change shirts for the remaining portion of the presentation, but I think I want everyone to remember what I was trying for here with the sweat metaphor…”

Performing in one of those beauty pageants or singing competitions? Instead of making the sweat something you’re trying to hide by keeping your arms down through the entire competition and making yourself look like you have no fluid dance choreographed steps at all — sing something like “Islands in the Stream” and set up elaborate props that will drop and spray water over your entire body. We’re talkin’ Flashdance like water here, people. The kind that will soak you so often and so much that what’s going on underneath your arms has no bearing on anything.

Taking clients out to an important lunch? Do you remember that scene in Jerry Maguire when Jerry’s co-worker had to fire him and Jerry looked down at that glass of water and you thought maybe he was going to throw it at his co-worker? Well, in this situation, YOU throw the glass of water on YOURSELF. But not just on your face. When no one is looking, take a glass and throw half a glass of the water under one arm, half under the other. Grab another glass, preferably an extra one and not one that belongs to the ultra-important clients, and toss it on your face.

The key is this: if just your under arms are sweating, that doesn’t look so good. But if you can get your entire face and torso to be wet as well, then you’re not SWEATING. You’re just covered in water or liquid of some kind. (Yes, you creative kids out there, you can also use apple juice.)

So the prognosis, you may be wondering, is looking good for sweating. That is, creative sweating. Because if you can create an illusion around the moisture currently affecting your nether and weather-regions…no one will look at you and think “eiw.” Instead they will look at you and think, “cool.”

Prognosis…is good.

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