Boys are definitely a creature unto themselves. How else would we get men the same way?

I think one of my earliest memories of understanding that boys were different from girls is having two little brothers stair stepped younger than me as my playmates.  I am thinking I was around 4 when one day we were comparing parts as many a young child does.  It just seemed so odd to me that we all had different parts but mine were the only ones that you couldn't aim.   I had to hover over the pottie while them got to stand.  I had no idea at the time that all parts weren't different it is just that one of my brother were circumcised and one not.  I do remember that I did try my best to stand and go but that was never much of a success.  I spent my young child as a bit of a tomboy.  We got new neighbors and they spent the whole day playing with me and my brothers and had no idea I was a girl until my mom bathed me and I had to put on a dress, I had no hair so they hadn't even guessed, though they were much older 5 and 6.  I did have a little sister at the time but she was still really little so no girls to play with.  My "aunt" Margaret lived next door, if you can call the property next to fifty acres next door.  She had two little boys just younger than me.  My cousins lived a couple of properties over, I had three older girls cousins. One a girlie girl that didn't spend enough time with me for me to have any clear memories of her so I am thinking we didn't spend any real time together, oh I did think of one her combing her long hair in the mirror.  One way older and one that I did spend alot of time with, but as an adult she is married and has a beautiful wife, and I recall her being tougher than my two boy cousins who I did spend time with. One of them drowned his momma's chickens in a mud puddles so was mean enough I didn't spend alot of time with him, unless he was in a nice mood.  I do remember that being called his name by my mom was a terrible insult and if you were called him name you were in some big trouble.  So with this as the playmate pool I had as a little girl is it any wonder I am outspoken and not thought of as girlie girl?  It was a surprise to me as an older adult to find out that she is in there some where but the boys just scared her into hiding. 

I recall the new neighbor boys as liking snakes, alot, they used to chase me around with them and put them on my shoulder.  I to this day hyperventilate when I am to near one. (My friend Twins oldest daughter once brought one up to me and put it on my shoulder and I just couldn't even talk or scream, she meant no harm but I couldn't move.)  I remember about that time my dad getting a brand new car.  We took it on a road trip to visit my grandparents in Geer Idaho.  If you have never been to Geer it is in a canyon on the Clearwater river, the highway in on one side of the river next to the canyon wall, there is a bridge across to Geer it is all set on a step hill.  My Grandma Gladys and Grandpa Jim lived in a house a ways up the side of the mountain over looking the railroad tracks below.  We had a nice visit I am think but don't really recall.  I do remember coming out of the house behind my Momma after hugging my Grandma goodbye, she was carry my baby sister.  Dad was in front of her and we were going toward the car.  The two boys were already in the car.  All of a sudden the car started rolling down the drive and over the side of the mountain, it was a little mountain but a mountain none the less.  My dad, in his black cowboy hat, was running as fast as he could after the car, he never caught up to it, which is a good thing as it would have killed him had he.  The car continued down the bank and came to rest on it trunk against the railroad track and the bank.  My dad ran to the car and opened the door.  There inside of the car were a 2 year old and a three year old, scared to death.  They were none the worse for wear, well except for Red had a black toenail.  Mom and Dad were so happy they were alright that the fact that Dad's brand new car was totalled didn't even matter in the moment.  You couldn't even back a car up for months with them in the car or they would scream, lesson learned, don't play with the gear shift on a steep hill or any other time for that matter. 

The times those boys did something that we girls wouldn't have thought up in a million years are endless.  My Little Brother when he was just short of 18 months used to say ready set go and then charge across the room and head butt you.  You would cry and he would laugh.  He went with my dad to town one day and returned with a turban.  He had said ready set go and jump clean through the window on to the highway.  My dad stopped the truck and there he stood blood from head to toe saying "wait for me, wait for me."  We called the nurse a "bully brat" when she was scrubbing the gravel from his scalp, the doctor said it was the closest we had seen to having a patient scalped.  My dad passed out at 187 stitches, and my dad never passed out at anything, well except for when we went to Canada and Sister fell off the bed, as a tiny infant, and had to have stitches, maybe he only got jittery when his kids had stitches, I digress.  When my dad walked into the house with Little Brother in his turban all my mom could say is "I knew something was wrong with Little brother."  He had a lovely turban and in the photos taken the next day he also had two slices on his face where he must have felt the need to have a clean shave with his turban as he slice not one side of his chin with the razor but took a second swipe for good measure or maybe balance.  He never could run across the floor at full tilt and head butt you after that, a blessing to my head to be sure. 

I am not sure I will ever get how the little boys or the adult boys, I.E. mans, mind works for that matter.  I innocently thought maybe it was just my brothers that did these things on a regular bases, but no, when Goofy came along you could put her in the sandbox and she would stay there and play for ever.  Not so my Bug you set him in the sandbox turned to pick something up and he was gone.  We had an 80 foot tall bull pine in the front yard, and as I looked back there he was half way up it, not bad for a 2 year old, though his dad was not happy to have to climb up after him, he had no intention of coming down on his own, up was so much more fun.  That was only the beginning of our adventures with the Bug, he got more challenging every year.  Still looking forward to the day he balances out and settles down on all levels, sometimes I see glimpses but then they can be fleeting. 

My daughter in law always looks at me like I am crazy, or a bug, when I say boys are a whole different creature than girls.  Well Eldest isn't all that exploratory but he has his moments, he just hides them well from her.  I say, and I stand by it, to my dying breathe raising a girl is nothing like raising a boy.  I am so glad the Lord blessed me with 4 girls and a boy.  I am not sure I could have managed more than one, well then there was our foster Son,  He was a challenge unto himself and he did nothing make me think my opinion of boy wasn't right on the mark.  So today I leave you, telling you an more of the tales of the boys in my life would not go down well with the cornflakes, I tried to tell only the ones suitable for morning reading...lol..... tomorrow.