Pink is the New Black

MAYRAV SAAR

Register Columnist

You can't tell from reading this, but my nipple just popped out of my blouse.

Boop! There it is, all pink and powdered and camera-ready. I'm usually a little more careful with my body parts, more discreet. But a girl like me can't afford to fall behind - and so, instead, I must fall out. Out of my shirt. Out of my dress. But never, ever, out of the camera's view.

When Ms. Jackson had her famous wardrobe malfunction at the Super Bowl two years ago, the exposure scandalized the country. These days, however, a slipped nipple is all the rage. Forget puggles. If you want to be somebody, you've got to pop out.

Rachel McAdams, Tara Reid, Keira Knightley, Lindsay Lohan. They've all flashed their headlights at paparazzi's flashbulbs in recent months.

It seems pink is the new black, and I am not one to pass up a trend.

I've been out of the public eye now for seven months, and I figure I have a lot of catching up to do. Instead of a subtle "pop," I'm going to have to expose myself round-the-clock.

So if you see me at the grocery store or standing in line at the bank, the answer is, "Yes. I know you can see my nipple. Now go tell a friend."

I can only hope to be as successful as Mischa Barton. Her little Skittle made its primetime debut on - this should make us all proud - "The O.C."

Now, I stopped watching "The O.C." when they killed off Caleb (the show just doesn't pack the same punch without the Donald Bren-like uber-villain). So I missed an actual viewing of Mischa's bobbing boobie. But, boy howdy, I didn't miss hearing about it: television, radio, newspapers. Mischa's mammaries were everywhere. No publicist in the world can get a girl as much exposure as, well, exposure.

I could use some semi-scandal buzz right about now. Stay-at-home mommyhood doesn't pay much, and no velvet rope bouncer cares how many diapers I changed today. I guess I could try to write more. But that's so Alan Greenspan.

These days, it seems, everyone is using her nipples to gain the kind of acclaim once relegated to those other twin workhorses, talent and perseverance.

I'm relieved that a simple slip has come along to free us all from the burden of "hard work" and other nonsense. Woody Allen said he didn't want to achieve immortality through his work; he wanted to achieve it through not dying.

Me, I'm taking another route. Why try when all you have to do to get ahead is pop a little pink? So, girls, put down your math books. The game is over, and our breasts have won.

Still, I am a little confused. I know I've been gone awhile, but wasn't Kabbalah the key to cool not too long ago? Are we supposed to study the 72 names of God andflash everyone we see? I can't keep up.

Or maybe a whole new trend will come along soon. Me, I'm as eager as a beaver to see that day come.

After all, the weather is changing and it's getting a bit too nippy around here.

This column appeared in the Orange County Register