First Day of Pre-K: Girl things and Boy things and how to tell the difference

On their way to Pre-K!

Today was the boys' first day of Pre-K. Last night I asked if they wanted me to just drop them off and leave or if I should stay. Unlike The Clash, they had no difficulty with this. I should go. Now. "I promise I won't miss you," Chas reassured me. Why not? "Because I like my teacher." I, being a glutton for punishment, asked if the teacher was more beloved than Mommy. They both quickly answered that they like "The Five" all the same. The Five?? 1. Mommy 2. Mama 3. Auntie 4. Heather 5. Mrs. G (their teacher). I was torn between pride in knowing they had figured out it the number in their heads so seemingly easily and horror at knowing precisely how unspecial I had become. I mean, I gave myself top billing, but it's pretty clearly an ensemble and I ain't a featured player.

So school went well. Their friend Kaylee shared some Cinderella thing which they said was cool but they don't want because "it's a girl thing." We asked for elaboration. Turns out girl things are pink or purple, come in an aisle at the store and are soft. Or hard. I think the boys feel the same way about "girl things" as the Supreme Court Justice felt about obscenity: They can't necessarily define it, but they know it when they see it.

That's what he said.

Went on the now-traditional annual Labor Day campout this weekend. A grand, if smoky, dirty and sort of disgusting, success. We rocked Millersylvania in the wilds about 10 miles south of the State Capital. Anyway, my grand-nephew Berkeley brought a friend -- a 12-year-old boy named Martin. Martin was a very nice kid. Too nice, as it turns out. See, my niece and Berkeley's mom, Delsa, kept getting after us for making dirty jokes in his presence. In our defense, these weren't "The Aristocrats" jokes. More along the lines of things like "get your hands off my wiener" while roasting dogs. (The semi-frozen wieners were a particular laugh-riot.) There was a bit of Michael Scott from The Office humor in the form of "That's what he said." or "That's what she said." The kind of stuff that most self-respecting 12-year-old boys would revel in.

Or so I thought.

After just one night of that he called his mom who drove down to pick him up bright and early in the morning. I didn't believe it at first. But it's true. My family sexually harrassed a 12-year-old boy with hard wiener jokes. Now, I know we are a little crude. But this is, I admit, a new low. Still, I have to think that if our kids grow up feeling like it's OK to make wiener jokes in front of us while camping, we've got a good shot that they'll feel like it's OK to talk to us about the stuff that really matters.

Which is really just a pathetic attempt to somehow justify saying "That's what she said" when somone complains that I put the tent pole in the wrong hole.