Gross = Funny

I was doing the Super Mum thing again (or at least trying to). In a spare half hour between dropping one son off at athletics training and the other son to his diving squad, I stopped at a coffee shop for some much needed sustenance (aka coffee) and to try and get some work done. I handed Master 8 a book and began furiously typing away at my computer.
I was engrossed in an idea for my upcoming book when Master 8 pipes up and gestures to something he is reading, ‘look Mum, this is really funny, see, he dropped the toilet seat on his thing.’ He laughs like this is one of the funniest things he has heard all week – (I seriously hope this is not the best that this week has had to offer) – before returning to the book. I am grateful that he does not ask for me to comment as I just don’t get it. Maybe my failure to see the humour in it is due to my absence of a ‘thing,’ maybe you have to be a boy to really get that one.
He later interrupts to tell me that ‘some guys finger is up someone else’s nose’ at this he laughs even more hysterically than the first time and it takes some time before he can manage to compose himself. Really???
I close my laptop, he’s got my attention now. I ask him what is so funny about that? Master 8 looks at me like I am an alien from outer space. ‘He has his finger up someone else’s nose.’ He spoke slowly, deliberately, spacing out the words like I was the world’s biggest imbecile. ‘But why is that funny?’ I ask, pressing him further. ‘Because it is gross,’ was his reply. ‘Although it would be even funnier if his finger got stuck up there and they had to walk around all day attached to each other.’ He then turns back to his ‘gross’ nose picking book. Apparently, our conversation is over.
For boys apparently gross = funny (hysterically funny actually), but for me gross = gross. Now it is my turn to look at my son like he is an alien from outer space… ‘Who is this weird creature?’ Why is picking somebody else’s nose funny? And more importantly, why would anybody want to do that? (Sadly, I’ve discovered it doesn’t necessarily get any better as they age. The other day I was watching a reality TV show where a male contestant threw his dirty underpants onto his girlfriend’s face because it was funny… once again, all I can say is really???) I am still staring at my son, trying to comprehend what it is that I am missing here?
I don’t think I’ll ever get it. Men truly are from Mars and women from Venus. There was however, a silver lining here: as much as I don’t get the humour behind a toilet seat dropping on someone’s ‘thing,’ my son is reading and this is a good thing. I would much rather he read a book, albeit about nose picking, than playing an iPad any day. Sadly, it is the nose picking and toilet humour that grabs our boys attention, just as the use of fairies, ponies and princesses in stories that are written for girls. Underneath all of this however, is hopefully something of substance; subtle messages and morals that help shape our kids into the type of responsible young people we want them to be. And so, I suppose I will make some allowances as I believe the end definitely justifies the means.
In an ideal world, things would be different but sadly I’ve discovered we can’t change our boys, it’s in their DNA. Apparently, words such as poo, wee, bum and fart are funny and this poor princess just needs to get with the program. Or escape to a really good coffee shop somewhere close and bang out a rant like blog, which is exactly what I did ;-)