Father's Day

This story comes from my book "101 Contrarian Ideas About Advertising."


The Talkative Child

Since Sunday was Father's Day, and I'm sick to death of writing about advertising, I thought I would serve up a little Father's Day reminiscence.

My daughter was a very talkative child. In fact, when we went on car trips it was not unusual for her to talk non-stop for 3 hours. Anyone with a motor-mouthed child knows that this is not an exaggeration.

One day we were on such a trip -- my wife and I in the front seat, my 5-year-old daughter in the back in her car seat. We were about 45-minutes into one of her relentless monologues, when suddenly the question popped-up: "Mommy, where do babies come from?"

We looked at each other, gave the nod, took a deep breath, and dived right in.

We told her about eggs and sperm and penises going into vaginas. She received this information in stunned silence.

Then came the kicker. We told her about how she was special. How, because of some medical issues, the doctor had to take the eggs from mommy and the sperm from daddy and put them together in a dish and then put the fertilized egg back into mommy.

Now she was totally lost in thought. You could almost hear the wheels spinning and smell the synapses burning.

One minute went by, silence.

Two minutes went by, silence,

Five minutes went by, silence.

Finally she spoke.

"Mom," she said.

"Yes?" replied my wife.

"I'm so glad you didn't have to do it the regular way."