Reluctant

One unexpected consequence of this OWL curriculum that Girl is working, is that she has come away determined to dam up the floodgates of her oncoming puberty. The whole business of what lies ahead must seem messy and unseemly and not worth the trouble, from where she sits. She is about the age of Anne Rice's vampire girl and it constantly puts me in mind of the tragedy of that character, forever frozen at that stage of development. She allows as how she might want a little more privacy at this age, but she is adamant that that is all the privileges of growing up she will avail herself of, for now, thanks anyway.

How weird and perverse that I am the one watching the pot, watching for the bubbles, thinking I might add a pinch of salt. What's the name of that one boy in your class that you said was hilarious?

I am channelling Erma Bombeck, which is hip nowadays, haven't you heard? We worry that our kids are developing too fast and we worry that they aren't developing fast enough. Yeah, howzbout I leave that pot alone?

MLK's dubious legacy

So, today's nugget of wisdom from the back-back seat of the van, is "Thanks to Martin Luther King, $4,000 and I can be friends. Because he's Black and I'm White!"

Um... where to begin?

You're so gay

Now it begins. Jones has this friend $4,000 who is very street. He tries in his own dorky way to keep up with him. Up until now, it's meant that he's taken to saying "ain't" a lot. But yesterday I overheard him taunting $4,000 saying "You're so gay." (Sigh) My own boy.

So, OK, teachable moment. But I was hoping that I would be able to lay these matters of sex and gender and whatnot out for him in some sort of coherent manner. I mean, the kid is still basically at the "Mommy swallowed a watermelon seed" level of birds and bees. I have busted out the graphs and charts on him, but I don't think it "took."

So, you mean to tell me that he's getting anything out of my "Gay is when a man wants to make a home with another man" lecture?