I have a nice belly button. It looks kind of like most other people’s belly buttons, a little taut, but not too taut. An inny. Your standard issue belly button. And to be honest until recently I never gave it much thought.

However lately it’s come to my attention that my belly button has become a thing of interest. At work people sneak glances at it, during family parties my grandparents openly study it. This new unexplained interest in my naval has me confused. I have a theory on it though. As a child I had a lovely smile and so people enjoyed gazing at my face. In my teens and early twenties glances drifted a little further south. And now in my late twenties people’s interest has settled firmly on my abdomen. It has left me wondering whether people are going to spend my late thirties and early forties looking intently at my knee caps. Perhaps this downward focused trend will continue right into my fifties and sixties where I’ll catch people randomly examining my toes.

Or possibly it has to do with the proliferation of technology and that people have simply forgotten where to look and in the future, social mores will dictate that staring off in every direction but the speaker is an acceptable practice. At any rate all this preoccupation is giving my poor naval a bit of a complex. It’s left pondering whether it should borrow the clip on belly button ring which flashes green and pink from my mother so it feels it might deserve all this newfound attention.

If this keeps up, I know one thing’s for sure- I’m going to spend a lot less time doing my hair and makeup in the morning.