The Sex Talk

I had the rather remarkable experience Monday of sitting down with my 8-year old son Benjamin at Baskin Robbins and having The Talk.

Not that I wanted to.

I grew up in the 70's, with The Waltons and Good Times and Little House on the Prairie on TV. John Denver and Stevie Wonder were on the radio. Families went camping for vacation. The raciest programming before Dallas debuted in the late 70's was Happy Days!

So I had no clue about sex whatsoever. It was actually a bike injury (don't ask) that prompted my stepdad to have The Talk with me. At age 11.

I love my little boy very much. It was a very short time ago that he held my hand crossing streets... that he still watched "Bob the Builder". I realize that he is in fact growing up very quickly, and that part of my job is to equip him for the real, fallen, world. But I resented having to have the talk now. I resented having to remove a layer of my oldest son's innocence.

And that's exactly what it was: I had to have the talk.

Everything around him screams of sex. And I can't even blame the TV, since my kids are limited to about two hours on Saturday and no more.

Every billboard, radio program, song, advertisement... everything seems to be screaming sex or showing nearly naked women. In fact, I found him once recently staring at a woman in the Chicago Tribune who was posed provocatively in her underwear for some bra company.

But get this: My kid got most curious by looking through the Bible he was required to have for school. Not the text of the Bible, but rather the notes the publisher puts all over the thing to help kids get what the text is saying. So this KIDS Bible was my son's most compelling introduction to the word.

And why did the publishers feel compelled to talk about sex in the notes of their kids Bible? Because they pretty much have to. Same reason I had to have The Talk with an 8 year old. If they don't, the reasoning goes, peers will. And they're probably right.

So I'm glad it was me talking to my son and not some teacher or peer. But I grieved a little nonetheless. I wished we could have had The Talk a couple years down the road. I wished that innocence could have been held onto a little longer, but my son's pressing questions could not be deflected any more.

So it's done. At least this installment of the conversation. It went well, as far as I can tell. And I'm sure that there will be many, many more installments to the Conversation.

But I have three more coming behind him.