Soapbox

October 16th, 1995

So I’ve got this kid…and I finally decided that I had put off having "The Talk" long enough. I didn’t want him to learn the facts of life first at school and embarass himself by shouting, "No way!" in front of the whole class or anything.

I had been sort of dreading this moment, because I remember my own "talk" with my mother when I was in 4th grade, and how I had been rather repulsed. Not only by the act itself, (which seemed pretty randomly stupid) but by the fact that my parents admitted to having done it! More than once! I could see sacrificing yourself once or twice for the good of the species, but what would make two otherwise sensible people want to… over and… yeesh!

So, because he is who he is, I eased into it by talking about heredity and genetics. He is really easily upset by things that you wouldn’t expect to upset a kid, but I know that anything scientific is cool to him. I discovered that he already knew an astonishing ammount of technical detail: X and Y chromosomes and how a fetus gets food and oxygen and cell division- everything but the actual method of delivery of sperm to egg.

Anyway, finally I bit the bullet and just flat-out told him just the bare bones of the matter. By the way, kid: here’s the deal with how that works.
He made a face and shouted, "Why do you want to gross me out like that?! I will never do that thing!" (Can I hold him to that when he’s 16?) Well you see what I mean about the sensitive thing. Maybe I should have gotten a nature documentary and let him watch some rabbits or something.

So I spoke calmly and patted his hand and steered the conversation over to umbilical cords and fetal circulation and soon he seemed to get over the horrible news I had delivered. This poor kid: clearly, life is going to hold some nasty shocks for him.
"Well," I thought as I went to the kitchen to contemplate dinner, " that went about as badly as it could have, but at least it’s done. I’ve done my parental duty and it’s behind us now, for a few years" I said to myself.
Turned out- not so much.
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