Let's just call it Mulva

The good thing about my playgroup is we're never short on interesting conversation. Witness last Friday when the discussion came up about teaching kids the names of their private parts. One woman doesn't want to teach her daughter "vagina" since it's really her "vulva" and she doesn't want to teach her the wrong thing. Someone else offered, "What about teaching her to call it 'labia' instead?" Being a good Protestant, I offered calling it "private parts" and leaving it at that. There was no consensus on the right answer. I also suggested "Mulva" in honor of the famous Seinfield episode where Jerry can't remember his girlfriend's name except that it rhymes with a part of the female anatomy (her name, turns out, was Dolores).

I was thinking mothers of boys have it easier, you've just got "penis" and "testicles" to worry about and they're all on the outside making it relatively easy to identify. Then I remembered all the controversy over the Caldecott winning book that has caused an uproar by writing "scrotum" on the first page. Sigh. It's funny, the first few months/years of parenthood are all about the physical aspects of survival - getting enough sleep (you and baby) and getting enough to eat. I'm realizing now that those are really black and white issues (baby is hungry, feed it), but as kids get older, there are more and more gray issues, like when and how to discipline, what religion (if any) to raise the child and how to describe their boy and girl parts.