Awwwwwwww, Nuts!

It is said that men cannot know the trauma and pain of childbirth. I agree that ipso facto that is indeed true being that we simply aren't built for that particular function. But it occurred to me due to certain events last night that women cannot possibly understand the trauma and pain of a good nut shot.

What brought this to the fore, Bill, you ask? I am glad you did because it happens to the subject of this blentry. You are so smart, dear reader! Right before bed, Em was trying to move her suitcase and kick an area rug by our bed into place at the same time while wearing backless slippers that were not cooperating. She was having a real time of it. I was carrying a dish full of fresh water for the kitty and Em wasn't doing an especially good job of telling me how I could help by way of using any language that I, (or any other human male I suspect), understood; I was essentially powerless to help.

While I was standing there dumbly watching her struggle, she was shaking the offending slipper off her right foot. It was a thousand to one shot at the buzzer from the half-court and she nailed it. And by nailed it, I mean nailed it. I got a glancing blow right in 'lefty' by the reinforced tip of a barely subsonic slipper. There's a real cheap joke there that for the sake of my younger readers, my smarter more savvy readers and my mother, (who belongs in the aforementioned groups, but alas is principally my mother), I will allow it to remain unwritten. If you would like me to send it to you privately, let me know. I'm sure you can figure it out. I was forced to be stoic as I was carrying the bowl of water and launching that across the room would only have made things worse.

But the pain needed to go somewhere. Since dancing the nut shot jig was out of the question, and I have never been one to not make things worse; I curtly exclaimed a few choice words in a staccato tone that indicated what Emily could do with her carpet and her slipper. She was apologizing even as I was cursing the pain, the slipper and the dumb luck of it all.

It was tense for a few moments and I wish I could take back the words I said. But this morning I got to thinking that it would be to the peril of a father in the delivery room to take heed to anything the birthing mother was saying. It must be excused due to the traumatic pain. Last night, I generally lacked the ability to think my way through this enough to try to explain it to Em and so we went to bed in a bit of a huff.

She apologized again this morning on her way to Nashville for the week and it was amazing how the pain came right back as soon as she did. It really is a terrible, traumatic sort of pain. And while a woman may give birth prodigiously in her life, (the more she does the higher the likelihood that she will have a T.V. show), I bet most men get waaaaay more nut shots in the course of a life than most women will have children. I mean, I certainly wasn't looking for a nut shot last night, but it found me. I don't know too many women who have found themselves suddenly in labor without knowledge aforethought, (although if she does, she has a high likelihood of being on a T.V. show being poorly and melodramatically reenacted by an only slightly more attractive person than herself with some sort of poorly written melodramatic voice over).

A nut shot can be, and often is, delivered to innocent bystanders. It is indeed among the plagues of humanity... or male humanity anyhow. I hope to be forgiven for my mouth and my knee-jerk reaction last night, Em. It was as beyond my ability to control as it was yours to turn back time and wish the whole thing away.