Wednesday 9 January 2008

Of Penises and Playboy Bunnies

I have always known that having a son would be a whole new world for me. Boys are smelly, often dirty, they break things just to get a reaction, and then there are the teen years: at this point, their brains go on sabbatical and leave their penises in charge. Eventually, Brain returns and it job-shares with Penis, making men reasonable human beings half of the time. Some of the time. For a few minutes out of the day.

I didn't realize, however, that the obsession with Penis began so early. Sacha has grave and continual concern for Penis. As soon as the diaper comes off, he has to hold it for fear that it will fall off or transplant itself onto our jealous neutered cat. In fact, Penis has become a being in its own right, as Sacha feels it entirely necessary to wave "bye bye" to Penis whenever I re-diaper him. He also has grave concern for his daddy's penis, as though he thinks that maybe, just maybe, his own Penis fell off and transplanted itself to daddy, in which case, it also deserves a "bye bye" salute.

At the tender age of 16 months, Penis has already started edging out Brain. Yesterday, as I read to Sacha, he pointed to a bunny in the book. As Sacha is prone to do, he then pointed and mumbled about another bunny, presumably in our house. We do not own a bunny, nor any other bunny type toys. He was insistent, however, that this other bunny existed, and led me to our bookshelf where, lo and behold, he found another book with a bunny on it: the Playboy bunny. We have a copy of the Playboy Bartending Guide, and it has a nice Playboy bunny on the cover and, as Sacha pointed out to me, on the spine. Penis then went for the kill - the back cover has a nice silhouette of a naked lady in a martini glass. When Sacha wanted to know what that was, I just smiled and said a "madame".

The Playboy bunny has become the prototypical bunny in Sacha's mind, thanks to Penis's efforts. He carries that 400 page book everywhere, demanding that I acknowledge his bunny about 500 times daily. I tried to hide the book, but the Penis-Brain duo of terror have made this highly improbable, as he has clearly placed a homing device on the bunny for emergency penile purposes.

I don't know what I'll do when he's 15. Frickin frack.

14 comments:

  1. Oh my god. Funniest post ever...

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  2. You slay me. I live in the land of girly girl stuff, and we are in complete ignorant bliss in relation to all things penis - for many, many years, I hope. Hats off to you, S!!

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  3. Thank you for the laugh... this is the funniest thing I've heard/read all day! Oh the joys I have to look forward to! We do not have that particular bunny book in our house, but I'm sure we have something inappropriate that my son will one day find...
    Good luck!

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  4. LOL.

    My son used to yank and pull on his penis at that age...especially in the bath tub.

    Nowadays, if he's yanking and pulling, I don't want to know.

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  5. I was cracking up reading this. My son does the same thing when I change him.

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  6. Oh boy, and I thought I had my hands full.....

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  7. You have a looooonnng road ahead. I wish you good luck.

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  8. My two sons learned at an early age to attach hand control on their penis. I casually redirected their attention to something else in hopes to distract them and teach them proper social response to their private body part. My girls never experienced this attraction. Even when they stated developing boobs, they never grabbed on to them and directed their focus to their developing female organ. My husband explained the male perspective that it is important and that is the way it is. I guess I will never comprehend the strong attraction from my female point of view. I accept it as the way it is and normal at that but still can't identify the necessity to fixate on that body part. Can you imagine baby girls with their fist or fingers poking their nether regions continually or incorporating vigina or volva into their communications? No! It just didn't happen in our home. I think boys and girls are just different.

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  9. LOL We only have girls but boys sure sound like fun.

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  10. yea , at my house it is the same thing about the penis....I have been told they worry about it not being there for life!! If I have to tell Connor "get your hands out of your pants", only 5 times a day I have had a good day! HA! Pray for a girlSara...although if she sees her brother naked like Elizabeth has questions come out even when they can not cleary speak!

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  11. Oh God, I hear ya! Puberty is going to be interesting...sigh...

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  12. too funny! it does start early, doesn't it? i posted in the spring or summer when first discovered his in the bath. ever since, he's been obsessed. he even tries to grab Zander's in the bath and when Zander's getting his diaper changed. Z just yells "No Logie! Dat MY penis!" ;-)

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  13. You just have to worry about when he's not just protective of it, but proud of it and wanting to show it to everyone of a specific gender... or possibly of non-specific gender. Some need to show them to everyone.
    And the waving goodbye when the diaper goes on, that will go away. He'll start wearing underwear eventually.

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