Some of the most rewarding moments for me as a parent are when I hear the names and explanations that my kids have invented to describe what they see. Chuck and I don’t talk “baby talk” to the boys, and we always try to address their questions with honest answers. Body parts are no exception. When the subject comes up, we tell it like it is; none of that “pee-pee” or “wee-wee” stuff. One thing they’ve never asked about, though, is a woman’s chest. In fact, it was Alex who provided his own name, “Puffs,” and contrary to my own convictions I’ve never corrected him because I think it’s just too darned cute and, coming from a young mouth, sounds much better than “boobs.”
According to Alex and Chris, “puffs” refers to one’s chest, male or female and a “puff” is one side of the chest. One day a friend was visiting with her kids and we heard Alex exclaim, “Chris, you hit him in the puff!” I explained to my friend what a “puff” is and I realized that the kids are soon going to outgrow the term, especially when their more worldly peers respond with “Puffs? What’s a puff? Those aren’t puffs, they’re boobs!”
One day, Chris was playing dress-up-stuffed-animals. He was showing me one clever female costume and, sure enough, he had even worked in the anatomy by creating “puffs” out of a small building toy with 2 spherical shapes connected by a short stick. It fit nicely into the paper-towel toga he had made for Mr. Bear. I thought maybe Mr. Bear’s stage name could be “Puff, the Magic Drag-Queen.”
Another time, we were walking through the lingerie section in a department store and Alex pointed to the lacy bras, turned to his brother and said “Eeew, look at the puff holders!”
Perhaps Chuck’s favorite is when Chris asked “Daddy, when I grow up will I have puffs like you?” Indeed, time to dig out the Bow-flex.
One of our favorite cereals is the Malt-O-Meal brand “Golden Puffs.” It is hard, though, to say the name out loud without conjuring a mental image of Aaron and the Israelites waiting for Moses to descend the mountain with a message from God, but Moses is taking so long that the people decide to make their own god by melting all their gold jewelry. What was Aaron’s defense when the righteously angered Moses finally arrived to see his people dancing and worshipping their new god?
“Moses, it wasn’t my fault! Those people put the gold in the fire and out burst this pair of great, big, golden puffs!”
And that's why he had to climb the mountain for a new set of Ten Commandments; Moses, wide-eyed in shock and wonder, dropped his load and the stone tablets shattered at his feet.