To wit: "I wrote this up a couple weeks ago for your 40/40 blog project. I thought I should sit on it a bit, and I have. To me, it's still quite publishable. :) I hope this finds itself someplace on the spectrum of entries you expected to get. If not, well, too bad. :)"
That being stated -- I actually wouldn't change anything in this entry from my brother J. I would like to think that this proved that I had a hand in preparing him to be more of a SNAG (Sensitive New Age Guy) and a "snag" for his future wife, not to mentioned a very enlightened daddy to his little girls.
Kickball Curiosities
I had to play kickball, and I found that troubling. Social Studies were cancelled and kickball was the toast of the afternoon for all fifth grade boys. Don't get me wrong—I mostly liked playing kickball. But I knew something was up; every last girl from my classroom—no, in my grade—was being swept into some secret meeting, and I didn't understand why. More to the point, I didn't like it. Even at that age, I wove my social web by being the weird guy surrounded by friendly females. And now I was expected to go spend two hours surrounded by just brutes? Oy.
I should back up a skoosh, since this post is about my dear older sister. She is six years my senior, so our social paths didn't cross all that often. By the time I was old enough to recognize that the entire world didn't revolve around just me (some hope I might actually realize this before I'm 37), she was deeply entrenched in the things of "big kid" life: choir, piano, high school, having a job, etc. I'm fairly confident it's precisely because our orbits were so different that we got along just fine (at least I don't recall any notable drop-down-drag-out fights with her). I don't like conflict, she doesn't like conflict—it works for us.
Thus it was I came home from school after a hardly educational afternoon of kickball to find the house devoid of all family except for my sister. I'm not sure how it came up, exactly—if I had to guess I'd say she was probably kind enough to ask me about my day—but I took the opportunity to express my consternation about my testosterone-filled afternoon.
"Do you really want to know what the girls were meeting about?" she asked, an air of cautious wisdom draped over her question.
"Yes," I answered quickly. I could tell this was going to be exciting stuff.
"You're sure?" she hedged.
"Just tell me!' I implored.
So she did. The strangeness, oddness—am I belaboring the point if I add weirdness?—that is the female menstrual cycle was very plainly and very efficiently explained to me. So well was it explained, in fact, that I could answer followup questions from not just the boys at school, but some of the (very concerned) girls, too. It's information that has served me well through the years, and I'm glad we had the kind of relationship where she could share.
Looking back to that afternoon of kickball all these years later, I totally understand why the lone male fifth grade teacher, a tall, brusque fellow, seemed so very elated to supervise the playground activities that afternoon.
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