::footprints of ie|en

I Could Have Been a Male?

An ex-collegemate came to visit a couple of days back. We were reminiscing on the good old (and bad) days of college. Somehow the conversation turned to his brother and then to his sister. It was then that I found out that both he and his second sister were born with cleft lip. Quite taken aback as I wondered about the possibility of that happening in one family, I very absent-mindedly and stupidly asked: Err, how did that happen? (like as if he knows why both he and his sister were born with cleft lip).

Surprisingly, he said: It was my dad. He caused this. Images of his dad forcibly cutting his and his sister’s lips came to mind. I’m not crazy or sick in the head but that was the very first thing that came to mind when he said that. He later explained that when his mom was pregnant with his sister, his dad decided to repair a broken door, and brushing aside the believe that one is not supposed to hammer on things whilst there is a pregnant woman in the house, he started hammering away. Thus resulting in his sister being born with cleft lip.

Later, when his mom was pregnant with my friend, his father started hammering away again. He didn’t believe that his hammerings caused his daughter to be born that way. Of course, he didn’t do that to test the theory. He was fixing something else this time and simply ignoring his wife’s and mother’s warnings. When my friend was also born with cleft lip, he never touched the hammer when his wife was pregnant with their youngest child. This time, he believed.

My mom joined our conversation at this point. She said when she was pregnant with me, she never did believe all these pantangs. She will simply brushed them away whenever someone told her not to do this and that. I asked: Are you saying there’s something wrong with me? At that point of time, I actually wondered if maybe there really is something wrong with me that I didn’t know of.

Ignoring my question, my mom went on to explain that she went on to saw a tree even though everyone told her not to. My friend said: Auntie, do you think prolly your daughter was supposed to be a male but your act of sawing the tree meant you actually sawn the penis off?? So she’s now a female.

Huh?! What?!

posted by ie|en @ 1:35 PM