Mom, can I take a banana to school tomorrow?

"Mom, can I take a banana to school tomorrow?"

“Sure,” I answered my 16-year-old son at the dinner table last night. “For a snack, do you mean?”

“Uh, no.”

“Then for what?”

“For Living Skills class.”

OK then, now I knew what he was talking about. Living Skills, for the uninitiated, is not about balancing your checkbook and basic cooking, it’s a euphemism for sex-and-drugs 101.

I glanced over at the rapidly diminishing bunch of bananas in the fruit bowl, debating if we’d have enough to make it through the week. I wasn’t sure.

“How about a zucchini?” I offered.

“Zucchini, banana, whatever.”

“Maybe if you took a banana you could have it for your snack later?” (I was having trouble with the concept of wasting food.)

“Nooooo.”

My 12-year-old could barely contain herself. She had figured out what this discussion was about. My 9-year-old wanted in on the joke. I matter-of-factly explained what the fruit or vegetable would be used for as my 12-year-old squirmed. My 9-year-old wondered why any one would want to do that. My 12-year-old wanted to know if the girls had to bring in bananas too, and if so, why. I came up with an answer. She then said she’d never be able to look at a banana with a straight face again, and thank you very much for ruining her dinner. I was wondering why the heck my husband picked tonight to volunteer for a phone bank and miss dinner.

After what was probably way too much discussion, I told my 16-year-old to check in the fridge, if we had more than two zucchini, take one, otherwise, take a banana. So he went to school with the banana.

Next month the electronic baby comes home. I can’t wait.

Cross-posted on Silicon Valley Moms Blog. Tekla Nee writes about life with her husband, three kids, and two cats in books, newspapers, magazines, blogs, and on scraps of paper all over her house.

Comments

[Leslie]

Banana -- good choice. He would have probably known forever after as the dude who brought the zucchini. I'm trying not to picture your son, holding a zucchini (ala Otter in Animal House) and saying something like "Mine's bigger." I'm sure you are too.

I don't think my daughter ever had that exercise since she went to a Catholic girls' school but she learned some valuable skills in middle school. When she started her period I was all ready to do the verbal instructions outside the bathroom door on how to use a tampon when she announced that she was already wearing one. Yep, they practiced that using their fist in 6th grade.

[Gunfighter]

OK... color me stupid, but what were the kids supposed to learn with the banana?

I went to school in the 70's & early 80's... I never had a Living Skills class.

[Lollie]

It's to practice putting on a condom...get it? It also serves a couple of purposes -- it encourages safe sex practices and sets girls up for a lifetime of unrealistic penis-size expectations. Plantains anyone?