by JULIET WATERS

I don't want to slag the day on which other people honour the special partner in their life. But I don't have one, so I decided to have a different kind of Valentine's Day this year. Since so many of these special days have become blatant exercises in consumerism, I figured I might as well put the day aside to honour the possession I most value. If it were the tradition in our society to marry our stuff, I would be at the altar with the constant companion I purchased at Canadian Tire, for $20, during the seventh month of my pregnancy - my exercise ball.

I discovered the necessity of an exercise ball in pre-natal class. During the last trimester, a woman's internal organs and intestines are pushed into a space about a 10th of what they're used to. I was putting about 90 per cent of my mental energy into trying to create an extra centimetre for them. Sitting on a ball created a gravitational pull that resulted in just enough comfort so that I could occasionally start thinking about other things, like the baby.

When I was alone at home and my water broke, I knew I would not be going anywhere without my ball, the only thing helping with the labour pain. It was a full moon and the maternity ward was chaos. Ben's father and I were stuck waiting for 14 hours before we could get a delivery room, a situation I could never have withstood under normal seating circumstances.

After Ben's birth, when the baby blues hit their worst low, the most physical exertion I could manage was draping myself over my ball, in a quasi-foetal position. I would imagine it filled with some kind of new-age amniotic fluid, returning me to a sort of pre-birth state. Before I knew it, I was gently rolling, stretching a muscle here and there, bouncing a little and eventually sitting up.

Finally, after owning it for about a year, I started to use it for exercise. While single fathers soon discover they must develop nurturing skills, single mothers soon discover they must develop shoulders. Babies just won't wait until the weekend, or even two days, to get their dose of roughhousing. The first time my back went out, there was my ball ready to help me out of bed. When I couldn't lift Ben, it was there for me to bounce him on, roll him around and give him the kind of daily blood pressure high he seemed to need.

As Ben grew and I realized I was going to have to start getting in even better shape, my exercise ball became my bench press. I learned a routine from a video by Montreal exercise guru David Sloniegura, inventor of the Abnatomy workout (available through www.fitnessdavid.com). This is an excellent 20-minute workout that tones all the important core muscle groups. Also, as a single mother recovering her sex drive, I really appreciated David's willingness to do the entire routine without a shirt. My only quibble was with the pounding techno house music. But once I learned the routine well enough, I could turn down the volume and drown it out with my Power Puff Girls soundtrack.

When Ben started hitting the worst peak of terrible twoness, when the tantrums were at their craziest, or when he was just plain irritable, I taught him the joy of "cooling down," lying him down froggy position on the ball and rolling him around, hoping that it would remind him of those days when he was in my tummy, pushing my organs into their tiny hell.

Sadly, last week I started to notice a weird kind of blister on my ball, the beginnings of some kind of cancerous air tumour. Soon I will have to buy a new one. Slowly I will watch the air leave the once-perfect curves of my blow-up buddy. But on Valentine's Day I drew a big heart on it, gave it one last hug, and took it out for one last bounce. :