Go Ask Dad: Holy Poop
On the drive home from a day at summer camp, my sons, ages 9 and 6, reported that they had learned the S-word. In the rearview mirror, I caught the conspiratorial look they exchanged — they were getting quite the education at this camp. Two days ago, the older brother declared the B-word was “bench.”
But they correctly named the S-word. Then, they waited with bated breath to see how I would respond.
I asked them if they knew what this word meant. They did not. I told them it meant poop. Unlike the B-word, it was not something you would want to sit on!
I don’t remember if my wife and I made a conscious decision to say “poop” around our kids or if we just fell into it … yeesh, I should stop with the puns. My parents taught my younger brother and me to say “BM” for bowel movement. But everybody poops in our household. The term has stuck with us. (Why can’t I stop? Probably because I’m writing about poop!)
When our first son was born, I learned a new word — meconium, which is the tar-like poop of a newborn. His first effort was handled by a labor and delivery nurse named Rhonda who wiped and re-diapered that baby with Poop Olympic record speed. I was awed and immediately thought of her as the Great Rhonda. My son didn’t have a chance to cry — he was swaddled and lying on his back before he knew what had happened!
When the next time came, I took my first turn. Though I must have emptied a bag of wipes, I still got meconium on his chest and my shirt and all over my hands. And my boy’s howls peeled paint off the walls.
“You’ll get better with practice,” the Great Rhonda assured me. Exchanging a knowing look with my wife, she added, “and you will practice. Right?”
Yes ma’am!
I actually came to enjoy diaper changing time. I’d sing silly songs in my best Bob Dylan voice. My kids would really giggle when I tickled their necks with my nose. I inhaled their laughter. Even the actual smell of poop wasn’t that bad … except on the occasion when something had crawled up their butt and died!
Returning to the idea of Poop Olympic medals, the first poop in the potty is a big deal … for parents! My wife and I didn’t institute a reward system, although M&Ms were involved in both of our childhoods. Still, I felt triumphant when each of our kids got it down. (I cannot help myself.)
But even with success on the toilet, I also felt sadness. They really do grow up so fast. One day, they’re on the changing table, babbling “Da-da” and then, they are cursing at you from the backseat.
These days, my dispensing of the waste of others is restricted to our dog, which involves biodegradable plastic baggies. Our puppy is named Ramona after our favorite literary hero. I find it telling that Beverly Cleary never narrated poop in her novels. To my recollection, the only bathroom scene involved Ramona the person locking Ribsy the dog behind the door. Cleary wrote in the mid-twentieth century when an entire generation of fathers never changed a diaper and never endured anything like the admonition of the Great Rhonda.
Times change. It’s like I told my boys that day on the drive home from camp: context is everything. The S-word just means poop, but it is not always an appropriate time to use such language.
“Is now a good time, Dad?”
The three of us cursed and laughed all the way home.
Andrew Taylor-Troutman is the author of Gently Between the Words: Essays and Poems. He is the pastor of Chapel in the Pines Presbyterian Church. He and his wife, also an ordained minister, parent three children and a dog named Ramona.
