The Cucumber

My parents are throwing a party tonight, of which last year's version was a big hit, partly because they organized some smashing interactive games. I got a little preview of one of tonight's games: it looks as though it will feature two lines of middle aged people passing a cucumber held between their legs, a la boat race style.

I thought that only pre-adolescents were allowed to laugh openly at such undisguised sexual innuendo.* But oh ho ho! the genitalia will never cease to be comedy! They are inclusive and transcendental: they were funny back when we were were drawing on caves, and they will continue to to be funny even when we are grandmas and grampas. It takes one's breath away to think that there is something so steadfast in this world of impermanence.

* Example: in Greek and Latin, we traditionally translate the word for "prize captured in war" as "booty." Thus, we often get hilarious lines like, "there is nothing I would give up for my honor in booty," or, "many brave men died in pursuit of booty." In class, we're expected to act with dignity; therefore, I'm one of the few giggling uncontrollably behind my book.