Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Late Starter

I like the Open Letter To Kansas School Board via boingboing.net. Funny.

It was both sultry and humid last night, so I had an extremely hot bath, which surprisingly didn't help. Also I'd been bitten three times by something, which was annoying, as it made it even harder to sleep. Anyway, for no particular reason, I suddenly thought of a conversation I'd once had with my Best Mate back at school, who was, through no fault of her own, female (she's still my Best Mate, which after you've read the conversation you will agree shows a certain amount of loyalty/masochism on her part. She's still female too). I was about fifteen at the time. I want to say I was much much younger, but that would be a lie.

I'm not even entirely sure why I'm putting this up, apart from A) I really did have this conversation, and B) not doing Green Wing at the mo, so converations I would normally put in the mouths of Guy or Martin are now sort of buzzing around with no outlet, other than the blog.

INT - LIBRARY - DAY

I am avoiding work and the outside by sitting in the library with BM.

ME: So it turns out vaginas are much lower down than I thought.

Quite a long silence. Finally-

BM: ?
ME: Well I thought they were higher up.
BM: Just under the chin?
ME: No, obviously, but you know... just under the belly button. Like almost immediately under.
BM: And now you know they're not.
ME: Yes.
BM: How could you not have known that?
ME: Well I've never thought about it that much.
BM: But you've seen porn?
ME: Well...
BM: If you have to think about it, you probably haven't.
ME: Can I count the Next Catalogue?
BM: No.
ME: Maybe I shouldn't have said anything.
BM: Have you not seen textbooks? In biology or something?
ME: Yes. But I never looked that closely.
BM: Oh my god.
ME: And then I saw this slightly iffy comic cover, and thought 'that's not right'. And I went and had a closer look at the textbooks, and turns out it was right, anatomically speaking.
BM: I have an art class now.
ME: Okay. What are you drawing?
BM: Well I'll be drawing bowls of fruit. But I'll be thinking about vaginas.
ME: Heh.
BM: I'm not going to be speaking to you for a while.
ME: Are you going on holiday?
BM: No.

22 comments:

felinity said...

PAH HA HA!! Oh bless you. Thank you so much for sharing. I hope you don't think better of it in a couple of hours.

patroclus said...

I felt I should make a comment to dispel the embarrassed silence.

Only joking.

And top marks for using a phrase like "anatomically speaking" at the age of 15!

James Henry said...

I've nearly deleted this post about 8 times. I still might.

felinity said...

Ahh, don't do that. It illustrates your cutely vulnerable, slightly nerdy (sorry), formerly innocent teenager side.

Plus, every time Guy says something which illustrates his blatant lack of experience with girlies as a teenager, I shall think of this.

cello said...

Ah, so that's what those boys were trying to do during the final slow dance/snog at '60s discos. (very late '60s by the way!)

Anonymous said...

To be fair, I don't think anyone's every written a set of directions. And everyone knows that men don't like to stop and ask for directions.

Anonymous said...

I'm now rather disturbed by the thought of mutant vaginas just below the belly button.

Anonymous said...

What, you mean as well as a normal one? oh god! That's awful!

James, what have you started!

James Henry said...

I think I'm going to get some people drawn here by google for entirely the wrong reasons, that's what I think...

Anonymous said...

Hahahahaha.
I wouldn't worry about it. I didn't know what an erection was for far longer than I should have.

Lizzy said...

Hahahahaha! Fab. Please don't delete - this is fantabulous! Now at least I know I'm not the only one who has weird conversations with my friends. I once had to explain to a friend the whys and wherefores of pelvic thrusting.

Yeah, I know.

Abaculus said...

Top marks for honesty and for making me laugh out loud in Starbucks. Nearly drowned out the muzak.

cello said...

I didn't know what "wank" meant until I was 20, and then found out in rather embarrasing circumstances.

James Henry said...

That noise you can hear? That's my mind, boggling.

Willie Lupin said...

I've found that whenever I've had strong doubts about a post it's turned out to be one of the most popular with readers. So please leave it.
When I was that age my mother and I read Last Exit To Brooklyn together and had long discussions about oral sex. What a wonderful broad-minded woman she was.

Anonymous said...

I can't help but think of the "French and Saunders" sketch about the girl who knows nothing about sex being told about it by the girl who thinks she knows about it, but doesn't...

Anonymous said...

Absolute classic. That reminds me of a friend of mine, who had a new girlfriend. She was about 6 ft tall; his previous inamoratas having been more on the munchkin scale, this was new territory to him. One night, during what we like to call "inappropriate touching", he had his hand, um, down below for about 5 minutes before she gently pointed out to him that that was probably all the stimulation her belly button could take.

James Henry said...

Now that's very good.

Anonymous said...

*laughs* see, this post can never be deleated now James. It's far too popular.

Anonymous said...

I came home from school at 14 and asked my mother what masterbation meant.

Bless her she told me the truth but how horrible must that have been for the poor woman?

Anonymous said...

Awww! That last exchange:
"Are you going on holiday?"
"No"

I think the comments prove that you're not alone James. If your sex-ed at school was anything like mine, you were doing pretty well to know of the existence of the vagina at all! I remember (admittedly at a younger age) all the girls in our year being given a talk on menstruation while the boys got a talk on fire prevention in the home! I wonder if any of them, as adults, threw buckets of water over their wives once a month?!

Izzy said...

I asked my gran what masterbation meant while she had two lady visitors. I guess it was her own fault for giving me a Jackie annual to read to keep me quiet!