I never thought it would happen, but it’s come to this. I’m wearing support hose.

Not all the time. I’d become a hermit before wearing those things out in public. But the minute I get home, I reach into the drawer and pull on the stretchy stockings that reach up to my knees and beyond.

I put them on with some effort because the darn things are so tight. I guess that’s why they call them compression stockings. Getting them off at the end of the day is even worse. The encased skin likes to bond with the spandex or latex or whatever fabric is used.

But they work. I have ankles not cankles, and they look pretty darn good.

I suppose since I’m a writer, swollen ankles are to be expected. I try to stand up once an hour to stretch and dance around the living room. There’s a little platform at the back of my desk on which I elevate my feet most of the time.

Maybe that’s why Stephen King is a notorious walker. He’s dealing with swollen ankles, too.

But nothing has worked. Why is that, I asked my doctor the other day? He pressed his finger into the flesh of my lower leg.

“You’re not that bad. I have the same problem. It’s the high blood pressure pills we take.” Turns out we are on the same medicine.

Seriously? It’s not the peanuts I consume about 3:00 in the afternoon or the caffeine-free Diet Coke or the occasional small bag of potato chips I have with lunch? How about the lack of exercise? Or daily consumption of string cheese?

I’m familiar with the side effects of medicine after my man’s former cancer doctor almost killed him by prescribing Keytruda. But who would guess that blood pressure medicine could give you fat ankles?

I remember when my beloved grandmother on my father’s side would come to visit on Sunday afternoons. She’d be wearing some sort of leg covering—an early version of compression hose, I’m guessing—as she sat in the little yellow chair, her legs splayed, her head nodding forward while she catnapped.

I’ll never look like that, I would say to my very young self. And while I reject that image of myself most of the time, this new wearing of support hose has me eating crow. Sorry, grandmother.

Recently I received Christmas wish lists from family members. To my delight, one child, a fun-loving, twenty-two-year-old, asked for “thousands of pairs” of socks. Not just any kind but Carmel City Mill boot work socks. They were advertised as “sweat-wicking, durable wool socks for long shifts.”

Aha, I thought: Support hose. And for someone who hasn’t turned thirty but has the good sense to protect his legs.

I’m wondering if Donald Trump has also become a fan of compression stockings after being called out by the news media for attempting to hide his cankles behind the Resolute Desk. A cheap shot some would say but, on the other hand, a wake-up call to pull on those stretchy hose every morning with pride.