The Talk.

The children asked innocently enough over dinner.

"How do the babies get in the mommy's belly?"

Matt shot Christy a look across the table.  She raised her eyebrows and her shoulders simultaneously, answering, "The daddy puts the sperm in the mommy's egg, which is in her belly.  Then it's kind of like a seed that starts to grow."

The children seemed content.  Supper went on.

The week passed and all was forgotten of the question until the family of five was in the van on the road.  From the backseat: "How does the daddy get the sperm into the egg?"

Matt, hands on the steering wheel, sideways glances at Christy.  She is a wildcard.  He doesn't know what she will say but prefers she say nothing.

Christy, in the passenger seat, ignores Matt's reddening skin and death-grip on her arm in his earnest attempt to squeeze her into silence.  "They have sex."

Silence.  Matt's knuckles whiten.

"What is sex?"

Matt's grip tightens.  Christy slowly loses blood flow to her hand.  "Sex is how the man gets his sperm into the woman."

Matt looks as though he is going to pass out behind the wheel and gives up all hope on not having the talk on the way home from the Food Lion with a six-year-old in the car. 

Natalie offers, "I know what it is!  Sex is when two people are on top of each other."
Daniel adds, "And they are mouth-to-mouth."
Eve infers, "And the sperm is so heavy that it falls from the mom's mouth into her belly."

Christy, despite Matt's pleas to please just stop talking, goes for it.  "Sex is between two people who are, hopefully, in love and married.  It's when the man puts his penis in the woman's vagina."

Christy briefly wonders if she should add anything about homosexual couples, but now she has completely lost all feeling in her arm and her thoughts are interrupted with a chorus of "Ewwwww!" from the backseat. 

"And you'd do well to remember how gross it is when you get older."  Christy is sure this should pacify Matt.

Natalie asks, "Do you get pregnant every time you have sex?"

"You could, but not necessarily."  No, Matt still hates Christy right now.

"So, did you and Dad only have sex three times?"

"That's none of your business.  We're not going to talk about that." 

Matt, having found elusive oxygen, exclaims, "Finally, we've found something you won't talk about!"


Christy will happily give the introductory talk to your kids in her dirty, duct-taped van while driving around the greater-Holly Springs area for a donation to her Ultimate Hike page.  Because kids' cancer sucks more than your husband listening to you tell your children how they were made.