penfield | Word to your mother

JERRY: Oh, so you're gonna meet the mother?
GEORGE: Yeah, I'll zip in, "How do you do?", zip out. She'll love me.
JERRY: You're good with the mothers.
GEORGE: You know, I'm better with the mothers than I am with the daughters.
JERRY: Maybe you should date the mothers.
GEORGE: Well, if I could talk to the mothers and have sex with the daughters, then I'd really have something goin'.
JERRY: Oh, you've got something goin'.
- Seinfeld, "The Gymnast"

village_twins informed me today that his mother is now a regular reader of this journal, perhaps drawn to the razor-sharp commentary on presidential politics and nude college co-eds.

Madame 'Twins joins, of course, my own mother, who pops up every now and then in the comment section to mention that I should be writing a book. Apparently 500 words every weekday is not enough for her; she evidently needs plot and character development. I would kindly advise her to switch her television from "American Idol" to "Masterpiece Theatre;" there is no character development here.

In a way, It makes sense that my demographic would skew toward the Oprah set. I've always been pretty good with mothers. You know that saying they used to ascribe to James Dean-style juvenile delinquents -- "Every mother's nightmare and every girl's dream?" Well, I was "every mother's dream and every girl's non-threatening platonic friend."

I have generally gotten on well with my girlfriends' mothers, or at least well enough to build up a reservoir of charm from which to draw down during those inevitable bumps, spats and uncomfortable revelations.

Even among my guy pals in grade school and beyond, I was regarded as a Nice Boy, perhaps even A Positive Influence. There was that one time at NC's house when I casually uttered a South Park-quality epithet, not knowing that his mom was in the next room, but I dismiss that faux pas since (a) it was a retort in self-defense, after having been verbally abused in the short term and the long term by NC himself, who (b) had such a facility with repugnant discourse as to make Andrew "Dice" Clay look like Mr. Rogers.

So, I want to make this a safe space for mothers, grandmothers, aunts, etc. Feel free to invite your own. But there will be times when I am called upon to make off-color remarks, indelicate proposals and morally obtuse judgments, all of which may be somewhat offensive to matronly ears. In these cases, I will be careful to place the acronym NSFM (Not Safe For Mothers) as a prompt for them to steer clear of this space and perhaps patronize a more family-friendly site -- you know, something with cuteness and babies and shit.