When I was a very young lad of three, bathing costumes hadn't yet been invented. This suited me just fine, but it also gave me much to ponder. As we would frolic in the North Atlantic undertow, I quickly came to realize that wee wees came in many different sizes, colors and shapes. I also came to realize that those creatures called girls didn't have wee wees and that seemed unfair and sad. Touching your wee wee was great fun. Girls had nothing to touch.
But one boy in particular, twice my age, not only had a wee wee, but one that was twice the size of my own and black. His name was Duane and he was black. I became attached to Duane and would deliberately allow the undertow to knock me off my feet so that I could reach for Duane's big black lifeline; and Duane never seemed to mind. In fact, he would smile and his lifeline would even get a little larger. Fascinating.
Instinctively, I understood that Duane's dark wee wee was far superior to my own and not just because of the size. I remembered how the men in my family would fight over the dark meat at Thanksgiving. Dark meat, I understood, was far more tasty and desirable than white meat. I envied Duane but was very happy to be in his company. And then there was that other difference.
As my mother was drying me off one day, I asked the question that would change my life forever. "Mommy, my wee wee is missing a piece and is smaller than Duane's." My mother explained that I'm Jewish and when I was eight days old my family had a big party and cut off half of my penis.
I was horrified. "Can I get it back? Can it be glued back on? Where is the missing half?" My mother laughed and delivered the bad news. But having noticed that a few tugs would make Duane's wee wee grow, I started tugging furiously on my own wee wee. My mother slapped my hand, but I protested and went back to work explaining to my disapproving mother that as I was playing in the surf I had discovered the stroking and tugging makes a wee wee grow.
My mother turned to my father and they exchanged one of those knowing adult looks. "Ricky," she said. "You're may only be three but it's time to choose."
"Choose what?" I screamed. "I choose to get the rest of my penis back."
"No," she said, "It's time to choose if you want to be heterosexual or homosexual."
I decided to listen carefully for fear that my parents would make another really stupid choice for me and cut off the rest of my wee wee as they had done when I was a helpless baby.
"We've seen you comparing boys and girls," my father intoned. "And it's time for you to choose.
"I'd like to make an informed choice," I responded. "Please provide the pros and cons, the options and then I'll take this all under consideration and make a choice; something I wish I had been able to do on the eighth day after my birth."
"Well," my mother began, "if you choose homosexual you can look forward to a life of marginalization, persecution, second class civil rights, a lower salary in your chosen career, no spousal benefits, an AIDS epidemic in the 80s, serious flatulence after sex--assuming you choose bottom, an increased threat of violence, being bullied in school, labeled an abomination by most of your fellow citizens and an increased risk of teen suicide, depression and substance abuse."
"And if I choose heterosexual?"
My father smile broadly and explained, "As a wealthy white American male? The keys to the kingdom and dominion over the world."
"What about Duane's dark meat?" I asked.
"No, no more dark meat, no more meat at all," Daddy said. "But you can have all the pussy you want."
By the age of three I already hated cats and was much more of a dog man, so the pussy thing was not a plus for heterosexuality.
And then I asked the most important question of all. "Mommy, Daddy, are you heterosexuals?"
"Of course," they simultaneously declared.
"And it was your decision to cut my penis in half?" They laughed as if this was a joke.
I grabbed my mutilated penis, looked across the beach to Duane's magnificent drumstick, drooled and made my decision. "Homosexual, absolutely and completely homosexual." And I haven't regretted the decision for even one second in all of my 59 years. And neither did Duane.
I was three, Duane was six. Nature vs nurture? It may be the stupidest question ever posed.
Comments