Monday, August 25, 2008

Fun Monday

MamaDrama is hosting and so I've decided to participate in my first Fun Monday on my new blog. So the assignment is:

What funny trivial fact do you remember that
you probably should have forgotten a long time ago?
I am only sort of playing by the rules. Mine is a not-very-trivial fact. I was given a bit of misinformation that led to one of my most humiliating moments as a teenager, which is saying a lot. This misinformation taught me that even teachers are not always right.
An important thing to know is that I went to a Catholic grade school. Actually I went to Catholic school from Preschool until I graduated from high school. Anyways, in fifth grade (around the age of 10 or 11) they separated the boys from the girls in order to tell us about the birds and the bees. The boys went off with a priest (stop snickering), and the girls went off with our female reading/religion teacher. . .
. . .I need to stop the story right here. Why were we being taught this by our religion teacher and not our, I don't know, science teacher is beyond me. But we were at least getting sex ed which is not true of every school. Considering it was a Cathloic school says a lot I think. . .
. . .Sorry, back on track. After more than a day of this weird class, our teacher opened the floor up to questions. We all got little slips of paper to write our anonymous questions and then the teacher pulled them out one by one to answer.
One of the first questions was, "What is circumcision?"
It's a fair enough question. My teacher responded (direct quote), "Circumcision is when a doctor cuts off the skin at the end of the penis. It doesn't matter if that is done to them, however, because the part that is removed falls off of the penis the first time a boy baby pees anyway."
I took this worth a grain of salt. It didn't really come up much in life so my brain filed it in the back and I moved on to more important things.
Zoom forward in time. Now I am a sophomore in high school (around 15 or 16). I am riding on a city bus with a bunch of my guy and girl friends. I don't know where we were going, but there were at least 15 of us sitting together on the back of a Chicago bus. For whatever reason, the guys we were with started talking and it turned out two or three of them were born at home and weren't circumcised (I knew because they were talking about it, not because I checked). If you aren't from America, you may not know that most people in my age bracket are circumcised as it was performed almost automatically back then.
As you've already guessed I decided to trot out my bit of info and said, 'Why does it matter? Doesn't it just fall off the first time you pee?"
I was laughed at for a long time, and "Doesn't it fall off the first time you pee," became a bit of a inside joke.
I am very aware what circumcision is now. Please don't try and tell me. I got it that very day thank you very much.
So I guess the real answer to the question is: I learned that the foreskin does not fall off the penis the first time a boy baby pees.
Check out my old Fun Mondays here.

16 comments:

Jo Beaufoix said...

Oh my Bob, the things we were taught in Catholics schools. That teacher should not have been telling you anything to do with biology me thinks, hee hee.

Driftwood and Pumpkin said...

How terrible that they would teach you that! Do they really think they are helping you by giving you misinformation? Holy sex-ed bungle, Batman!

Hootin Anni said...

I'm still laughing at the 'inside' joke you posted about the boys going off with the priests!


Loved this Fun Monday. Mine is posted. Hopefully this is a bit on the 'FUNny side' too. Drop by if you can, won't you? Happy day to you.

Jeanna said...

Hilarious! I hear ya about Catholic school, I was a victim from grades 1-12 as well. At least they didn't try to tell us anything about sex until we knew better and then it was "the penis will fall off if you have sex before marriage."

Anonymous said...

I'm laughing but cringing at the same time....oh the misinformation.

I was told by my sex-ed teacher that even lying next to a boy naked could get you pregnant....one little sperm could fall out and find its way up inside.

It's all scare tactics.

Sandy said...

When I worked at the police department, this woman came into file a complaint because her daughter became pregnant swimming at the public pool. The officer's response?

Our water is hard, ma'am, but it's not that hard.

Thanks for reminding me of this story.

ChrisB said...

That is so funny I cannot believe teachers would trot out this stuff.

Mamalang said...

I could understand if that piece of info actually had something to do with abstinence, but what the snot? Really? How horrible for you. At least you could blame on the nun :)

Faye said...

Well I'm totally impressed with the Chicago Catholic school kids' range of conversation on the back of the bus. Brings to mind my high school physical education teacher. Glad I didn't get sex education from her. . .

Trixie Twatwaffle said...

Your misinformation completely beats my misinformation that I received.

I LOVE this story!

Thanks for playing!
Margaret
http://blogs.chron.com/mamadrama

Woodlandmama said...

Jo Beaufoix- No. She really shouldn't have.

ipost- Mostly the info was helpful. Maybe I shouldn't have paid so much attention.

hootin' anni- I told you NOT to laugh.

Jenna- I went to progressive Catholic schools. It's still considered progressive (for a Catholic school).

karmyn-I've found that it does mostly because lying naked next to a boy never ends there.

Sandy- You're welcome.

chrisb- Yeah, it may have been better if she had said nothing.

mamalang- maybe it was circumcision propaganda. At any rate, she was a lay teacher, and she was married.

faye- it was a Jesuit school, and you know what they say about the Jesuits.

TxGambit said...

Eeks! I am soooo glad I was in public school by then. Of course I remember nothing about the birds and bees talk to lotta good it did anyway.

Pamela said...

you know... your teacher may have believed that herself. ha ha.

Alison said...

too funny...gotta love that Catholic school sex ed..I had it too!!

Anonymous said...

I gotta go with Pamela here... Perhaps it's good I blocked out all my useless info., Lol.

I hope you'll stop by for Pet Peeve Tuesday!

Jill said...

now THAT is funny. he he!