“Look, Daddy! I have a penis!”

Oh, lord, what now. I’m afraid to look at her. I turn to see her three-year old naked body arched back, her hands pinching her privates into a phallic mass. She is giggling, obviously pleased with her new trick.

Of course, it’s the most hilarious thing I’ve seen. Well, the funniest thing I’ve seen today, anyway. But one look from the wife tells me that I can’t encourage such behavior, so I clench my teeth and pretend not to be interested. “Yeah, neat, honey.”

The child senses my struggle not to laugh, and adds a final sound effect. “Look! Pssshhhhh…” pretending to pee on the ferret. Now he looks at me.

It’s a familiar look.

“I swear to all that’s holy this comes from your family,” my wife says in exasperation.

Having three girls has filled my life with moments just like this. Moments that now seem to replay in my head like a Hollywood film clip montage. I stare at the wall, and it fades to when my firstborn, our Best Behaved, as we sat in the middle of the congregation quietly listening to a Bible talk, and, while trying to stifle a laugh, she squeaked out a fart. Now, people will tell you that girls don’t fart, but it’s not true. They do. If you don’t believe me, try and tickle one for about five minutes straight. Just don’t light a match afterwards.

The wall fades again, and refocuses on our toddler, just barely a year old. She has that wonderful, innocent, toothless smile on her face. “Ah, Daddy! I can smile at Daddy! Hi, Daddy!” Daddy stops everything to bask in this wonderful moment, to immerse himself in the warmth of her wonderful unconditional love. So beautiful. So perfect, so pure. Not like that Jenkins toddler across the street, who looks like her face caught on fire and someone tried to put it out with a Garden Claw. But this perfect, grinning, cooing child, with stars in her eyes, staring at her Daddy, is heaven on Earth. His eyes wet with emotion as he beams at the pure delight visible on her face.

But, the smile on his face slowly shrinks, as he notices something in her hand and on her lips that pulls him out of the moment. Something brown. Something gooey. Something – oh, God – something from the ferret’s litter box.

The previous owner of the brown goo comes bounding up the stairs, looks at me, then her, then me. There’s that look again. Like he’s disgusted with me. What’d I do?

The synapses fire, and the montage fades to the same ferret enjoying some ‘quality’ play time with the three-year-old (the one with the fake penis). The wife, immersed in a telephone conversation, hears the small animal screaming and clucking at the top of his lungs. She opens the door to the young girl’s room, just in time to see him being swung around like a lasso! By his tail! Fast! Round and round! Wheeeeee!!! Like a lasso, I say!! The mother yells, “HEY!!!” The girl stops, and the last twirl knocks him against the dresser. He struggles free, and spends the next woozy few minutes hidden in a pant leg, contemplating the powerful lesson he has learned. (That lesson being, of course, don’t scream and cluck when lassoed around a room. The sudden stop might get you hit against a large piece of Winnie-the-Pooh-themed furniture.)

Oh, he’s fine. You PETA people, put down your pencils. This flashback contains a bit of comic exaggeration.

Just a bit, though. He really was woozy.

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