I came from a family of two girls. I had a father, but I am pretty sure I was unaware that boys existed until I was well into my double digits.
My daughter? Not so much.
“Tsai?” she asks me while we are giving her two-month-old brother a bath, invoking her universal catch-all phrase that means “what’s that? Who? When? Where? And can I have a peanut butter sandwich?”
A little taken aback, I stumble, but quickly regroup. “Well, that is his penis.”
She nods. “I want a pini.”
“Well, Alan is a boy,” I explain. “That is why he has a penis. Girls have something else.”
She nods. “Tsai?”
“Girls have a vagina. Mommy is a girl. Daddy is a boy. Alan is a boy. Sammy is a girl.”
She nods. “Sammygina?”
Yes, I tell her, proud of myself for overcoming my first Scary Parenting Question No one Wants to Answer but Kind of Has To.
The only problem, of course, is that a two-year-old is not equipped to handle such exciting information. Now that she knows boys have pinis and girls have ginas, she wants to tell the world. This is done largely by pointing at crotches, especially in quiet places like Starbucks and shouting, “Boy! Boy! Anni (Alan) also boy! Pini! Pini,” gesturing wildly and pointing to everyone’s crotch.
I am hoping that her sense of decorum develops faster than her pronunciation.