“Smell my finger Mommy.”


I should have known better.

I had been at the computer for almost 30 minutes. Miles had been sitting on the potty, watching a TV show. We were making great toilet-training progress that day last week. And at the time, my son’s finger looked clean enough.

I leaned toward his extended index and inhaled an unmistakable odor.

“Was this in your heinie?” I asked, knowing the answer.

YES, he said, with the same amount of enthusiasm he would have used if I had asked, “Miles, cupcakes for dinner?”

I suggested he take a whiff of his own finger. “Pee-yew,” my son said. “Stinky.”

I guided him to the bathroom to scrub his hands and talk about dirt and germs.

Later I chastised myself for not suggesting a bubble bath. That would have been the ultimate clean fun activity, since we could have chatted more about hygiene, and I could have scrubbed his heinie and his hands at the same time. Sort of.

Yesterday I got a second chance to teach in the moment.

Miles stole my computer mouse while I was online. I chased him laughing through the living room and out to the deck. He tossed the mouse under the picnic table. I grabbed it, turned my back to my son, and shoved the mouse down the front of my trousers.

Miles was baffled. He grabbed my wrists and examined my hands. He searched behind the curtains inside the sliding glass doors.

The mouse began to creep down my 7-month pregnant belly, bypassing my crotch and lodging on my right thigh. I threw my hand down my pants, rescued the mouse and held it high in the air, triumphantly.

“You hide it, Momma!” Miles shouted, sounding proud of me. “You hide it in your ja-eye-na!

What? I asked, knowing the answer, just needing to hear him repeat it.

“You hide it in your penis!”

No, I corrected, I put it in my pants.

“Pee-Yew,” Miles said, running away from me, “You have stinky ja-eye-na!”

I halted. Since the dawn of my puberty I have lived in fear of stinky-vagina-osis. Now that I’m pregnant, and in my opinion, more susceptible to the condition than ever, I bathe twice a day. Apparently, it’s not often enough.

But thanks to our recent smelly finger incident, I was prepared for any odorous orifice situations.

“Well, if I’m stinky, then I’m going to take a bath.” I headed upstairs toward the master bathroom, my head held high.

“Me take bahsh too,” my son announced, grabbing my hand to ascend the stairs together. “I have stinky penis toooo.”