Two Turtle Doves: This Ain't No Chapstick and Flip Flops

Why do you they always give the same kinds of freebies when you go to a trade show or expo? How many printed tote bags or stress balls do we need in one lifetime? For some reason, whenever I get this free crap, instead of putting in the Goodwill pile or throwing it away, I keep it, just in case. I have yet to experience a stress ball emergency, but I know that when that day comes, I will be ready with a squishy brain in one hand and pig selling insurance in the other. Not only will my stress be relieved, but I will have the most moisturized lips, thanks to my collection of logoed lip balms. I haven’t had to purchase lip balm in over eleven years.

My older daughter, E, found one of those lip balms in my office the other day. I got it at the Upstate Women’s show, and I don’t know why it was sitting out in my office because I don’t use it. I have at least two lip balms right now that I should toss but again, for some reason, won’t. One of them is from E’s orthodontist, and it smells like oranges. I don’t like things that smell like oranges, unless they are actually oranges, which I still would not smear all over my lips. The other one is was what E found, and the reason I won’t use it is because I don’t know what it smells like. It could be banana or pina colada or coconut or Hawaiian Tropic or Jerri Curl. Whatever it is, it doesn’t exist in nature, and therefore I don’t want to smell its odor directly under my nostrils.

The mystery lip balm was a freebie from an orthopedic group that specializes in neck issues. E picked it up and read the side out loud, “Upper Cervical?” and started to laugh. E is now twelve. She knows some stuff about sex because I taught her, but she appears to know more female anatomy than I realized.

“What’s funny about upper cervical?” I asked her.

“You know, Mom, your cervix, cervical, and this is lip balm, and you put it on your lips,” she giggled. And then she took her other hand and demonstrated where lips would be. On her jeans. And she was right.

“Dear God, how do you know that?” I asked.

 “Cause those are lips too, Mom. Gosh.” This bit of expert knowledge from the same girl who is still convinced a tampon will get sucked inside you, never to be seen again, as if a vagina were a black hole in deep space.

I still remember when my daughter was a little girl, and so naive. Why, it seems like just yesterday she was only eight and had yet to learn how certain body parts worked, let alone what they are called. I remember this one time when she was getting ready for her bath. She had taken off her clothes, wearing just her underwear, and she was prancing around in that way that children with no modesty do.

She called to me, “Look, Mom!” and pulled up her panties high in the front, creating not just wicked camel toe but an actual front wedgie, which my friend MJ would refer to as “pleavage,” a fancy word for pussy cleavage. I got an eyeful and then I looked away. “I’m wearing a thong!” she announced proudly.

“Well, you’ve got it on backwards,” I told her and stepped out of the bathroom.

I remember being surprised that she knew what a thong was. Hanes doesn’t exactly make Dora the Explorer thongs, nor can you purchase thongs with the Disney princesses’ faces all over them. She learned about them from somewhere, though, much in the same way she knows that lips aren’t just on your face. I thought she was learning about tapeworms in science, and tapeworms don’t have labia.

I am going to throw that lip balm away right now.