The birds and the beansprout

I know it, my momma knows it, the surgeon knows it, and now you're gonna know it too: I AM A PRUDE.

In our house, we don't have what you all have. We have little generals, gladys knight and the pips, yoo-hoos, and BTMs. I cannot even say "belly" without blushing. I blame the Pope. Also those little mauve handbooks they gave us, secretly, in grade 5. Handbooks that, having fallen into the hands of one PK, who I'm sure grew up to be a very nice man and a pillar of his community, were a source of shame and consternation for easily 7 months. Every morning he greeted me with "Isn't it wonderful being a girl? Are you MEN-STROO-ATING today?" And then punched me in the head or twisted the skin on one of my forearms so tightly that I got blisters. I think he liked me. Or he hated me. With boys it's hard to tell.

So tonight Lief wants to know about babies. He's 7, it's time. Right? I had always envisioned having a good friend who is a mid-wife come and give him the talk. I've put it off now for ever, with talk of baby catalogues, molehills, sub-porch dumpings of infants, the bee balm thing, etc. Tonight, though, I took a deep breath, and, inspired by dinner, also a cooked shrimp and a bean sprout. And put on sort of a puppet show, with the bean sprout swimming through the air toward the unsuspecting pink crustacean.

Writing "pink crustacean" has made me kind of uncomfortable. You see how bad it is?

I can imagine Kid in 20 years, lying on his shrink's couch and speaking of bad dreams involving Thai food. Going now to put another $20 in the online therapy fund. He's going to need it.