Hell of a morning to try posting anything here.  Crummy night’s sleep as rest attempts were pulverized by contorting and kicking children.  Elsie’s robust, barf-inducing night cough landed her in the big bed with mom.  I bunked with Jacko who slept like a giant, bony starfish. When Elisa got up early I limped my crooked back back to my bed which proved just as violent an experience. My tiny 3 yr old’s version of snuggling involves climbing, burrowing head-first beneath me and kicking daddy in the jimmies.  I oughta go to bed plastered so I can sleep through these assaults.  Or at least fight back with snores and flatulence.

   Nevertheless, I got up in a fair state of mind.  A cup of coffee and I was whistling the soundtrack to a happy day.  Did a little writing, had a little breakfast, said nice things to the kids and decided Hey, I’m gonna blog some shit!  I finished the end of a post handily.  ‘Cause it was cut & pasted from something written ages ago.  When I shot for some opening sentences, however,  those slumbertime demons became the Hadean goblins of writer’s block. 

First it was all the “happy screaming”.  You can’t let that go on too long since it always presages ”mad screaming” which invariably leads to “She/He-kicked-me-in-the-eye screaming.”  I got flat out ignored when telling them to cool it a bit. They had filled a little pop-tent with every pillow in the house, embedded themselves within and were trying to roll it around my room.  Pretty cool, I thunk for a second. But the screaming hadn’t stopped and since Jack was blasting his baby-talk at the top of his lungs I lost it. My own barking included a nice string of invective; adult words my little boy might now use in place of his baby-blabber.

   A cigarette was called for. I’ve been quitting again, down to a few a day.  But nicotine fits run in direct proportion with frustration so I stomped into the garage, ripped open the Parliaments with my teeth and jammed a fag into my face.  Except that it couldn’t be lit because there wasn’t a goddamn lighter to be found.  My neck was about to rupture from the tension and I started to dig my nails into my skull, thinking about tearing it open to let the insanity out. I was gonna shave the heads of my precious bastards and looks for the Mark of the Beast, because it was certain that Satan was in my freaking house and he was dicking around with me big time.

   All that just to write a ridiculous little piece on underwear….

   In the previous post there was a tangential mention of my view on boxer shorts, which caught the attention of a reader. It felt like it deserved an expansion. The whole notion of the Boxers v. Briefs argument seemed awful silly once upon a time. It’s just underwear, yes?  You wear whatever you want or what the girl you’re into says she prefers.  Since the chicks I’d been swinging with never laid out a preference I just kept on with my comfy favorites – briefs. Boxer briefs, that is, though they should not be confused as a hybrid.  I was at peace with my panties in my early 20’s until a friend called that choice into question:

   You still wear briefs?! Jesus, how old are you?

   Crap, yet another indication I was failing to mature.  I even considered switching, for a couple of minutes, before concluding my pal was a jackass. On his way to law school; and lawyers are all connected by serious character flaws. At least the male ones, who suffer from a frat or beehive sense of the world. No matter how creative they are when shredding law they can only see the rest of the world as they’ve been instructed to.  The best music is what the radio plays the most; the best wine is the most expensive; and you wear boxers because the upperclassmen clones at Chi Beta Jerk wore them. 

   Lucky for me, I soon moved into an apartment with best friend and his boyfriend.  Among the many things I learned from gay men it was that boxers were not only for clones and idiots – they we were meant to be worn by the fat, the ugly or the nerds.  My lawyer buddy was probably right in the idea of boxers being a mature choice as well. The mature, mid-life crisis guys in the gym locker rooms all wore them.  They wore them austerely even though their over-stretched, pendulous testicles dangled past the lower hem. Gravity got them because their undies failed to protect them.

   So I eschew boxers. With that we arrive at one of the few philosophical constants to my worldview. Men wear them to their peril either as fashion fuck-ups or under misconceptions of mature manliness. It’s an ugly mistake which will see them slurping crybaby soup through weakening teeth as their testicles reach mid-thigh by middle age. The retention of elasticity is paramount not only to the waistband of your undies but to the scrotum they protect. Nuts enjoy cradling in the restful restraint of briefs and, dammit,  I will pull my dick from the slot in my skivvies when I want it out – not because some flimsy underwear fabric can’t keep it in.