A Man's First Condom

Footfall after footfall. It was eerie sounding in the silence. Thud, thud, thud, like something sinister in a monster movie. But there was nothing sinister there, only my own steps on the cool grass. High above a full moon was shining behind a thin curtain of clouds. It was something like a provocative sheer dress, draped around a pretty lady, beckoning. The pretty, very pregnant lady in the sky did not look sinister, but her lingerie was unexpected.

Life is frustratingly unexpected to a person that really likes to control outcomes. Walking at the edge of the woods long after dark, I tell myself everything is just as it was during the day, only lacking the light. But of course, that isn’t the case. The night creatures are out. The things that go bump in the night are out. You just never know, because life is, annoyingly, unexpected.

It was humorously unexpected this afternoon. I was in the driver’s seat, cruising through a neighborhood of close together houses for people that didn’t have the good sense or the good taste to want trees to walk next to under a pregnant moon. Those aren’t the sort of neighborhoods to live in, but they are excellent for yard sale-ing. The tot was making two ponies talk to each other in the back seat. The boy was across from her with an animated wallet in hand, ready and waiting with chore money for any toys that caught his fancy.

The wallet looks like something that a middle school boy would want to buy - a classic first wallet. It has a brightly colored scene of a graveyard on it, complete with a scary looking skeleton guy walking around. My husband had given it to my son recently after he dug it out of a box of odds and ends from his childhood. He told the story of how it was the first thing he had saved up his own money to buy. The boy was impressed and happily put his couple of dollars into it.

From the backseat I heard the boy say, “What’s this? I found it in the pocket of the wallet.” I turned my head back while sitting at a red light and caught sight of the unmistakable poopy-brown colored Trojan packaging. Two condoms were still connected by their little perforations and folded neatly together. They had been patiently waiting for their moment of glory for a very long time.

“Oh, those are papa’s. I will give them to him,” I said very nonchalantly, despite the smile that I felt forcing my lips into one enormous upward curve. It may have turned into that big moment when the boy learns all about the birds and the bees. If it had been the chatty tot to find them, certainly there would have been a great deal of discussion. But, being the quiet type that he is, the boy asked no further questions.

“What is the expiration date?” My husband asked on the phone a few hours later. That was the big question. How long had these sad condoms been waiting to be used? This is how babies are made, son. I imagined a conversation as I shuffled for them in my purse. By the use of a very expired condom.

“1999. You were twenty years old then,” I felt that smile coming back to my face as I tried to imagine my husband at that age. I had met him eight years later, and undoubtedly he was a very different man by then. In my mind there stood an awkward semi-grown man, hopefully shoving condoms into his boyish wallet.

I was curious to see if the condoms were still functional looking after twenty years. Probably. But maybe they would be a bit crispy—that would be life’s way of keeping up with the unexpected. I tossed them in the trash with packaging still intact. Condoms are gross. I just wasn’t that curious.

I finished my walk by the woods and went back inside at midnight. I then decided to write about condoms and life, instead of going to bed. That was unexpected.

Goodnight.