one at a time. Can you imagine the onslaught of testosterone if I were deluged by 7 males all at once! I’m lucky I don’t have night-crawlers and crickets in my pockets or ogle Victoria Secret commercials. Growing up I did have 3 brothers (besides 2 sisters) and several male uncles our age. They were very interesting. They had ideas, they acted on them, and they moved. I liked that. I moved with them. Guess I was bit of a tomboy.
We blazed our way through the tall weeds on the hillside. We fished for sunfish in the creek. We got lost on the sheep trail along the banks. We made tunnels through the hay bales in the barn. We watched hammerhead critters grow in the trough. We stepped on black snakes, played cars in the dirt, climbed fences for apples and cherries, roasted apples under a mulberry tree and got spanked for it. Fires, you know, burn down a forest?
We hid in a hollow trunk of a sycamore tree. We buried money under the clothesline. We watched the cat have kittens under dad’s rack of plumbing pipes. We climbed the side of the chimney on the outside of the house. And we sat on the roadside to count semi’s that honked as they passed when we motioned with our arms.
We rolled a big wooden telephone line spool around the yard. We raced balls down the sidewalk. We put on a play in the side yard. We played church and we baptized in the bathtub. We jumped off picnic tables into No. 2 tubs and we poured dirt down the fuel pipe to the furnace.
We played in the sand pile until I drank it from a Pepsi bottle. We built a tree house beyond the barn. We explored the neighbors back yard and stepped on thorns. Dad insisted he get to pick it out, Mom said, "Here, read the comics to distract you.". We painted posts and picked up unloved baby birds, and we poked grass blades and sticks into the outside electrical outlet then let the flap fall shut.
We melted crayons on the cement with sun rays through a magnifying glass and we pretended to parallel park our pedal cars. They could do things, all the boy things, and we had fun.
When my own first boy came along, Mom said I’d have to teach him how to play. So, the first thing I did was get some Matchbox cars and get down in the dirt to make roads. And I taught him to make the putt-putt sound for a farm tractor. He still remembers it with a grin. That trickled down because he then taught his brothers how to play cars and tractors.
Mom also said I’d have to get the bluff on them because as they’d get older and bigger and I’d need the “I’m Mom, and I said so” to carry meaningful weight. It’s worked. When I couldn’t out brawn them, I’d have to outfox or out maneuver them. Sometimes simply bluff.
Now, we talk cars. Mustangs, Ram Tough, engine performance and ci (I now know this is cubic inch, the size of an engine, yes, horse power is the size of the engine but this isn`t horse power. Do you really want me to explain the difference?)
Here the 9 year old says, “Type in Hemi Cuda. Yeah, that’s right, R, R, R, R, Rrrrrrr!” like Tim Allen on Home Improvement saying, “More power, R, R, R, R, Rrrrr.”
We talk Poulan, Homelite, sharpening tools and cc (No, this is not the same as ci. Let me assure you, it’s not important to the women reading this either.)
We talk garden tractors, Cub Cadets, and HEI’s (see, I’ve even learned it’s not a word, it’s an acronym).
We talk canine and “You don’t want to know how I get the dog to not bark at night.”
We talk politics, Rush Limbaugh, Mitch Daniels, and “if I were president.” The next to the youngest tells how when his boss passed out Obama buttons he called his brother over. “Look at this! Target practice!” The boss says, “Son, come here,” and motions with open palm to give the button back. They grin and laugh in the retelling!
We talk guns and calibers and clips and firing pins. Hubby says, “Here I’ll bring you one, it’s easy to find.” One boy pipes up, “Wow, we’re playing guns, whoo-hoo.” Hubby continues, “There`s rim fire and center fire. Where the pin hits the bullet. A center fire is a clean shot and it`s high powered.” If they ever offer to clear the table, don’t think it’s to play a board game or that they’re feeling like being helpful. No, it’s because they want to clean their guns!
Shopping? What’s that? You want to do what???? Shopping — a word that needs defining for a man. An abstract concept. Most never learn.
There’s no one to suggest going to a bazaar, or eager to go on a yard sale jaunt. They don’t care that company walks into a messy house or that the car needs cleaned out. If there’s only one pair of clean underwear, that’s good, “what’s the problem?” They don’t get multitasking or reading body language. You can’t discuss the underlying mood of a previous conversation and it`s nuances….they take it at word value.
There’s no one here to commiserate with about PMS, the thought processes of a man, the way clothes fit or the clash of colors in home decorating. They don’t understand the bother of make-up. Nor the lure of a fine pair of shoes.
And decency must be taught. Careful here. Don’t let your mind take off. I’m talking about bodily functions. When it comes to women, they turn their heads from “nature talk” (as a matter of fact they’ve developed a code signal where they put their index finger to the center of their forehead and turn away. It means “never mind” “don’t go there” “don’t respond.”) But when it comes to themselves underwear is not partial nudity. A fart is funny. Any tree will do. A belch can be a beautiful thing. And why do you need to shut the door?
Well, it’s time for me to shut the door. Time for me to end by saying that living in my world of men has been a natural progression; one I’m used to, and one with which I’ve been blessed. I suffer from an overload of pride and humility that these are mine. Besides, I do get kisses and gifts of flowers and lots of laughs. And don’t forget the brawn. I get brawn for bringing in bags of groceries. And bags of groceries. And bags of groceries. “Grocery day again, Mom!”
~Pamela~
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