Old Wives' Tails

“Old” is a relative term. A baby is not considered “old” a week after it has been born, but we would consider last week’s TV Guide to be “old”. There are many things like that in the world. But the one I’d like to know about is wives. When is it that women go from blushing brides to old wives? And at what point do they start to develop their tails?

I’ve heard about old wives’ tails for years, but I have yet to see a woman with a tail. I can only assume that old wives buy special pants that somehow hide their tails or that they wear baggy clothing or large coats to keep their tails from being seen. And what kind of tail is it? Is it prehensile like a monkey’s tail that can be used to grasp things? Is it a defensive mechanism like in some lizards? Does it wag when the old wives are happy?

Everything I’ve heard about old wives’ tails has been in a negative light. “Don’t believe that, it’s just an old wives’ tail” or “Go ahead, it’s safe. That business about it being bad for you is just an old wives’ tail”. From the way it’s talked about, the tail of an old wife seems to be something that causes poor judgment or decreased brain function because everything associated with old wives’ tails seems to be inaccurate.

Biologically speaking, the development of another appendage late in life would probably take a great deal of energy on the part of the body. This effort must cause vital nutrients and blood flow that normally would go to the brain to be diverted to the newly developing tail, hence resulting in the previously mentioned decreased brain function and lack of judgment that causes all these old wives to come up with their inaccurate notions.

But what is it about marriage that causes the onset of the old wives’ tail? Why do single older ladies not develop these tails like their married counterparts? All in all, I believe that more medical funding needs to be dedicated to the research of what, exactly, causes old wives to grow tails.