8 y/o daughter pushed for, and we got her, an email account. She’s been asking me, with blended despair and diplomacy, when I could help her get an Apple ID.
She left the following voice mail on my cell phone late this afternoon while I was at work:
“I was wondering when you’re coming home ’cause I’m super super super anxious to get an Apple ID really soon ’cause my friend wants to do Facetime with me, but I need a new Apple ID password you already know my phone number and, yeah. Bye.”
Google Voice transcribes my cell phone voice mail messages. It interpreted the call:
“I was wondering When You’re Going To Be home to say I’m super super super anxious tagged nap, but I do you really soon because my friend what to do face time with me. But I need a new lot like the password bloodied not bear and yeah.”
Paid bills for an hour tonight, then having never used Facetime, got to work through a Facetime/Apple ID oddity/snag/feature. Great success! As daughter got into bed I spoke with her from my laptop to her iPod Touch and it was a funny 30 seconds. Should be fun next time a family member is out of town. Though Facetime doesn’t seem to be as exciting and beloved as when it first launched with beautiful people with winning smiles engaged in touching, heart-rending chats during commercial breaks.
Moved over to my 11 y/o son’s room, where he reported today was the first of THE TOPIC in school about the birds and the bees. Whole class. Coloring pictures of genitals with crayons. Funniest terms for genitals they’ve heard: “disco stick”, “corn dog”, “hot dog bun”, “taco”, “black hole”, “where the sun don’t shine” (last one my son’s contribution). Acne. Body functions. More discussion tomorrow.
Less harrowing than in MY day. Boys and girls in separate rooms, watching animated films about amoral nature soon wreaking havoc and would completely betray our conception of ourselves and reality. “Whoah, my body will do WHAT when I’m asleep and I won’t be able to do ANYTHING about it? People are laughing about hairy palms, now I am too, but I don’t understand what they were saying about what DOESN’T cause hairy palms?”
You know, stuff that still rattles us and holds us in thrall to this day. However the report of this sex ed curriculum seemed a step forward for our species. My question: “During coloring, did anyone ask for the silver or gold crayon?” Son: “No, they gave us all the same limited selection.”
2 comments
Soon he will learn about the Golden Vagina. It is MORE than the Oregon O. It plays music or Sports Center or whatever is needed to lure the man into complacency. It's a siren song. A dream catcher of the netherlands.
He shoulda asked for a gold crayon!
I think they have two weeks of puberty training. I'm not sure how many hours each day, generously, maybe two? That'd be 10 hours total – one push up before the big game. No, that's too critical, I'm glad they can do even that. The rest, experience, rumor, videos and us. Us, hmmm. A woman said to me few months ago, that there's a lot to be said for a wicker basket full of condoms by the front door. 10 theoretical classroom hours, maybe it's no wonder they only had a limited selection of colors; imagine if they could do a mural, with oil paint – taking days to dry, always being overlaid with other colors, leaving colors where they aren't always meant to be. I wish they'd post the drawings though outside the classroom, as they do self-portraits. It's always been fun seeing kids through their work. 'The tartan? That's so totally Michael.' (Yes, making up a name so as not to associate anyone in particular with tartan take on the true colors of reproductive bits.) B told me that the coloring project had made some girls cry when her class went through what was called the FLASH curriculum a few years ago; she and G more nonchalant and peaceful; sibling bonus points maybe.