and I’m the dad.

May 9, 2013 | 2:08pm

More About Sex

[Scene:	I have disabled internet access on his iPod Touch, but Luke, age 8, still has plenty of apps. One of them is the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, which I was using to look up a word...]
Me:	"Hey Luke? What are all these words under 'recent searches'?"
Luke:	"What do you mean?"
Me:	"Well, there's 'sex' and 'sex act' and 'sex symbol'... looks like a couple of dozen words related to sex."
Luke:	[acting alarmed] "I don't know! I didn't look those up!"
Me:	"Hmmm... except for me once in awhile, you're the only one who uses this."
Luke:	"I didn't do it! It wasn't me! I think s-e-x is disgusting!"
Me:	[puts down the device] "Look. You're not in trouble. I just want you to know that if you ever have any questions about sex, you can talk to me or Mom, okay? The only way you will get in trouble right now is if you lie to me, and then you'll only be in trouble for lying, not for using a dictionary."
Luke:	"But why are all those words in the dictionary? They're gross!"
Me:	"It's a dictionary. Its job is to explain what words mean, and all those are real words that people use."
Luke:	[taking a deep breath] "Okay. I did read all those words. But none of them explained anything I wanted."
Me:	"What do you mean?"
Luke:	"I was reading all those definitions because I was hoping one of them would explain why the whole world is so interested in sex! I don't understand it! Sex is gross! And kids at school are always talking about sex even though they totally don't understand it. And there's magazine covers and people having sex in movies and all of it. But none of the definitions said anything about WHY people like sex! It's all about HOW and WHAT and stuff."
Me:	"Well... the simple answer is that our brains change as you get older and you find sex more interesting."
Luke:	"My brain is going to change?"
Me:	"Yeah. Lots of things change in your body as you get older, including your brain."
Luke:	"And then it will make sense to me why everyone is interested in sex?"
Me:	"Basically."
Luke:	"Does this happen to girls too?"
Me:	"Yes."
Luke:	"So is it one of those things that doesn't make any sense from the outside, but once you're in it, it makes a lot of sense?"
Me:	"I won't promise you that it will always makes sense, but it will make a lot more sense, I think."
Luke:	"Man, life is weird."

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March 29, 2013 | 9:50am

While waiting for the bus, Luke — now 8 years old and in third grade — mentioned that a kid at his school was constantly “humping” things. I asked if he knew what it meant. He knew it had something to do with sex, which I confirmed. This kid also talked about “teabagging,” and Luke didn’t know what that was. I told him it also had to do with sex but I wasn’t going to explain things like that at a bus stop. Anyway, to me, questions like this confirm our decision to have the first “sex talk” with him nearly a year ago…

Luke: “And can we stop talking about sex? And petrified pee-pees?”

Me: “Yes. What would you like to talk about now?”

Luke: “Butt jokes.”

Read the whole thing here.

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Filed under: sex talk penis vagina sex talk petrified butt kids boys child children childhood parents parenting parenthood dads fathers fatherhood fathering school peers education

February 12, 2013 | 8:45pm

Hey, Dads Who Support Birth Control!

The vast majority of my posts are stories about my kids, or sometimes by or for my kids, but every once in awhile I dust off the Keyboard of All Seriousness and type something different.

I am linking to an old post of mine because birth control still seems to be a hot topic in the U.S. political and media realms. In March 2012, I wrote:

Recently, CNN published an article titled, “Why don’t men in favor of birth control speak up?” It pointedly asked:

…where in these recent debates are the voices of ordinary men? Why aren’t we hearing publicly even now from husbands who are not ready to have children they would have to support? Or from boyfriends who do not have the means to support a child?

I am one very ordinary man who absolutely, completely supports the birth control coverage requirement. I’m going to continue discussing this below, probably in far too much detail, but if you’re a man who supports birth control, please speak up. Say so on your blog or Tumblr or whatever. Say it on Facebook or Twitter. Write to your local newspaper. Seriously. Birth control is not just an issue for women.

Actually I wrote a helluva lot more than that. If you read the whole thing, you’ll see I talk about religion and Republicans and science and Scripture and all kinds of stuff. I used the letters “sex” at least 24 times.

In any case, I remain amazed at the politicization of this topic. The situation may actually be more acute than it was a year ago. Dads — or any parent, really — what say you?

June 13, 2012 | 8:55am

"Look at all these pictures! Why all the women showing off their boobs? Boobs are big, round, and disgusting! They’re gross! Who buys these magazines anyway? I’ll never want to look at that."

— Luke, age 7, observing the photos of scantily-clad models on the magazines along a supermarket checkout line

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Filed under: boobs breasts boob magazine disgusting gross sex sexual kids dads child children childhood parents parenting parenthood fathers fatherhood fathering supermarket checkout magazines media

May 7, 2012 | 9:03am

Do you know the f-word?

Luke:	[age 7] "Do you know the f-word?"
Me:	"The one that rhymes with 'truck'?"
Luke:	"Yeah, that one. What does it mean?"
Me:	"It has lots of meanings, I guess. Originally it meant to have sex."
Luke:	"But why is it a bad word?"
Me:	"I don't know why some words become worse than others. It's just a more crude way of saying the same thing."
Luke:	"Oh. Like how 'fart' means the same thing as 'toot' but it's kind of a more nasty way of saying it."
Me:	"Yes, like that. Actually there are a lot of words for sex. Remember yesterday, when Grandpa was talking about two animals 'humping' each other, and you asked me what that meant, and I said I'd explain it to you later when your sister wasn't around? 'Hump' is another word for having sex. There are lots of words like that."
Luke:	"But that's not as bad as the f-word?"
Me:	"Not really, but sex is a private thing anyway, so it's not something you should be talking about except in private. Of course, 'hump' has other meanings which don't have anything to do with sex. Like humps on a camel."
Luke:	"Does the f-word mean anything else?"
Me:	"Well... it's a swear word. A kind of a word called an 'expletive'."
Luke:	"An expletive? Like, it explodes?"
Me:	"Sort of. Most of the time, expletives are words you use when you have so much emotion and meaning all at once that you don't know what else to say. Sometimes I swear if I stub my toe and it really hurts. It just comes out of my mouth. I guess you could say it explodes out of my mouth. Boom."
Luke:	"Oh, it's like when I ran into the door at school the other day and said the h-word. It just popped out of my mouth. I didn't even know I was saying it until I had already said it."
Me:	"Yeah, it's like that. Of course, when someone says the f-word as an expletive, they're not usually thinking of literal, actual sex. It's just meant to be emotional. It's also usually really negative, though sometimes people mean it in a really positive way."
Luke:	"Huh? A positive swear word?"
Me:	"That's the way they mean it, but there's pretty much always a better way to say it."
	[pause]
Luke:	"So... what other swear words do you know?"

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May 4, 2012 | 9:28am

Re: Notice anything?

Per this morning’s picture… maybe it’s time I gave Luke the first socks talk?