Mating 101

I had a strong suspicion when I learned about the birds and the bees at the age of eight that I would most likely find it difficult to find someone willing to put the boots to my (even then) sarcastic carcass.

Even before my mother got the delightfully graphic book How You Were Made out of the library, I knew (along with my little sister) that babies grew inside a mommy’s tummy, and eventually were discharged from the mommy’s vagina; like a squalling, incontinent, drool-producing ball barreling out of a cannon (at least that is the way I imagined it.) But that’s all I knew.

Baby production did not interest me in the slightest, since I had absolutely no desire to breed, and was confident that the adult version of me would feel the same. At best I found babies to be boring, and at their worst they were downright annoying. All they did was sleep, cry, and poop, and their utter helplessness inspired contempt in my breast rather than protectiveness. Not that I would have ever hurt a baby, I just avoided them assiduously.

My sister, Holly, on the other hand, has always wanted to be a mother, even as a little girl. She thought boys and men were icky, however (in her estimation, the penis she saw on a baby boy was the ugliest thing she had ever seen) so even though she knew she had to get married before getting a baby in her belly (this was a long time ago) she was not going to kiss, snuggle with, or even touch her husband.

She had it all planned at the age of five. At the wedding, when the priest said “…and you may now kiss the bride,” she would share a little air smooch with the groom. No dancing at the reception, because that would necessitate touching. No feeding each other cake.

Cooties, you understand, must be avoided at all costs.

I imagined that the sexes would be separated at the reception, with the girls on one side of the room and the boys on the other, an invisible but respected line dividing the two halves of the floor. And a rollicking good time had by all!

“What are you going to do for fun at your wedding? Play Barbie dolls? Watch Speed Racer?” I deadpanned, already a smart-ass at the age of eight.

My sister couldn’t wait to grow up and start shooting babies out of her cootch. I didn’t want to grow up (I relished not having to work for a living) but did admit that it would be nice to stay up as late as I wanted and to eat dessert before dinner.

When one of our neighbors gave birth to a baby and distributed pictures of the little scrunch-faced rat, I was surprised at its appearance. The mother was blond and fair complected like my mother, but unlike my sister and me, this lady’s crotchling was olive skinned, with a crop of black hair that stood on end like a troll. It appeared to have a mustache. It was the most hirsute baby I had ever seen.

I couldn’t understand how, if the baby grew inside the Mommy’s tummy, it could look so much like the Daddy. I asked my mother about it, and she decided that it was time to let the cat out of the bag and got How You Were Made out of the library.

I found the book fascinating and gross all at the same time. It had drawings of a naked mommy and daddy clutching each other and engaging in a stupendously hilarious act called “sexual intercourse” while gazing at each other in benignly smiling bliss. They both looked calm and composed, not a hair out of place, as the artist caught their aesthetically sterile little romp mid-fuck.

The book went into lurid detail about erections and lubricated vaginas (hee!!), semen and spermatozoa (Yuck!!), eggs, ovulation and fertilization (WTF?!?) among other pertinent sexual matters, and it was all very thorough and excruciatingly illustrated by some dingbat of an illustrator who apparently keeps an unchanging convivial grin on his/her face and never gets ‘hot and bothered’ or fires off a stupid facial expression whilst screwing. You shouldn’t lie to little kids like that.

I remember feeling astounded that the daddy’s urethra carried the semen he was so smilingly spewing into the mommy, because that was the same tube that carried his urine! Barf-a-roni.

Holly’s gonna love this, I chuckled to myself.

As if she were a mind reader, my mother sniffed me out and warned, “Don’t tell Holly about any of this. She’s too young, and she doesn’t need to know yet.”

“Not even about foreplay?” I asked.

“Jill Staci, I’m serious. I promise you that you will be punished if you say anything to her about sex.”

I mulled it over, and made my decision.

I sauntered over to my sister’s room, where she was sprawled on the floor playing with some of her dopey post-toddler toys.

“Get out,” she ordered.

“Okay, but first I want to ask you something. Do you still want to have babies grow in your stomach when you grow up?”

“Yeah,” she replied warily, looking at the cover of the book I was holding as I leafed through it, trying to find the illustration that would be the most illuminating.

“Yeah? Well, before the baby can begin growing…” I flipped the book around and shoved the illustration in my sister’s face, “…. YOUR HUSBAND HAS TO STICK HIS PENIS IN YOUR VAGINA AND PEE ALL OVER YOUR INSIDES!”

It was worth the spanking.