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I was married for 60 years to a man who looked like the Pillsbury doughboy. Name was Franz, and he was soft and painfully white. Nothing wrong with that, but we could never quite get intimate the way I wanted. Between having to lift up his belly to rummage around for his little dingy and mistaking our sweat-soaked memory foam bed for his chest, I was dry as the Sahara for all 60 of those years.

Since sex wasn’t an option, Franz and I did sexy massages instead. These were just regular massages with our tops off. I’d massage him while he sat at the edge of our bed heaving and looking out the window somberly. Sometimes, he’d read Goosebumps and that always helped him finish. Supposedly. I don’t know. I never saw him finish because it all happened under the soft folds of his belly, so I just assumed it was done whenever he let out a deep resigned sigh, like the kind you hear in depression medication commercials.

So for 60 years, I gave Franz constant massages. The heel of my hand on top of his large moldable back, and I’d press down firmly, pushing his rolls down and forward with smooth strokes. Down and forward. I remember the way his body would bounce back, plump and stretchy and slightly moist, and I’d fold the fat over and do the whole press-down-and-forward thing again.

Anyway, Franz died of a heart attack last year and now I knead dough at Pillsbury for a living. Everything’s fine, really. It’s as if nothing’s changed.