I Don't Have A Vagina — HERCULANEUM

I know that you probably already know that, but I just wanted to clarify. I was talking with a wonderful new friend that sent me an email today that shows 3 baby porcupines. The photo showed all 3 in the palm of one person’s hand. They didn’t look real, but rather more like toys. I thought that they were really cute, however my first thought was, ‘OUCH!’ that can NOT be fun on the momma porcupine’s vagina. I just thought, okay, where does that come from? Talk about a need to have a cesarean, that’s a pretty good reason, nothing like giving birth to a ball of nails. Although, I’m sure that Barbara Bush and Madonna could do it no problem. Martha Stewart probably could too, she could probably blow one out of there while she was hanging drapes, look at it rolling across the floor, wonder for a second where it came from, think that it'd make a great Christmas ornament, spray-paint it red and hang it on the tree.

So, it got me wondering, why would I be thinking about those baby porcupines from a vaginal point of view? I haven’t really wanted a vagina before now. And I don’t want a vagina; at least I don’t think so. I think because they were babies, I mean it must have got me pondering. I have never looked at an adult porcupine and wondered how they come out. I’ve just never thought about it.

Well, it turns out that the gestation period comprises of 7 months, producing just one off-spring and…drum roll please, the quills are soft during birth and harden one hour later. Whew.
That would be some dedicated biology there. Speaking of which, how do porcupines have sex? Very carefully, I imagine.

I give women so much credit. The female is actually quite amazing, very much goddess-like. They really have a lot to deal with in regards to their reproductive stuff. I certainly would not want to go through what they do. However, I am extremely envious when it comes to the idea of being pregnant and the bond that comes with nursing one’s offspring. I’ll never know what it feels like to know that you have life inside, living and growing because of you. I’ll never feel the first kick, or the rest of the movements as the baby continues to grow. Now granted, I know that there’s a lot of horrible things that happens during pregnancy, I know that it’s not all roses, but I’d like to know, to feel it, to experience it completely, the good and the bad. And to know what it’s like to have the baby come out. Does it essentially feel like just a giant shit that you’ve never taken before? Does it feel like a basketball just came shooting out, or maybe a giant submarine sandwich or a turkey?

My cousin Steve experienced his son coming out screaming. The baby was already crying as he was being born. Steve said that the image was hard to shake, seeing a head sticking out of his wife’s vagina screaming. Yeah, I’m thinking that would be kind of hard to forget.

Nonetheless, I would like to know what it’s like. My biological clock is ticking quite loudly these days. And I’m not even sure that I want children. Although, Will gets really disturbed because I walk around the house trying to breastfeed the dogs. Of course, his discomfort with my doing this just makes me want to do it even more. I don’t really try and breastfeed the dogs, but I certainly pretend that I am. I don’t know why, it just cracks me up.

I do have a need to take care of living things, our dogs, our birds, the plants, caring for our family members and friends. If I didn’t have beings to care for, I wouldn’t feel like there was any reason to be alive. And someday I probably will be caring for some adopted children, but occasionally I do lament that I don’t have a vagina…not that I want one to put stuff in. Our friend Julie refers to it as "The Garage", and another one of our friends Kaelen wants to know what she puts in there if she’s referring to it as "The Garage". This one time in sixth grade, Julie threw me down and tore a hole in my favorite mustard yellow corduroys. Well, I don’t have to tell you that I was pissed! So, I kicked her in her crotch, like anybody sensible would do. She was bent way over holding her groin crying, yelling to the entire playground that I just caved "IT" in. Everyone stopped playing kick-ball and just glared at me, as though I was the devil. Until, they saw that she tore a hole in my trousers, then they went back to playing kickball. See? They knew what was going down. Anyway, she’ll never let me forget it, 25 years later and we still talk about it as though it were yesterday. When reminiscing about the incident, she tells everyone that I "kicked in the garage". I feel bad that I womped her in the puss, it obviously hurt, but she did rip my favorite pants after all.

Regardless of our ‘roles’ in society and the labels that we wear, I do like being a man. I have it pretty easy being a white male in our country, being a gay white male is another story, but I would just like to know what it’s like to be pregnant, with life.