The first time I remember TC using a bad word … well, I’m sure there were plenty of times before this incident, but this is the one that stands out.

Mind you, this is also when I thought “hell” was actually a bad word. Because it’s not now. You didn’t get that memo? Allow me to kindly inform you.

IT used to scare the shit out of me. Like, you’re going to go straight to hell and die and rot there for eternity. Glad I got over that visual early on.

Back to hell.

I am 7. Brother #2 and I are playing with a gift from dear granny. A back massager. We used to have a bunch of those back scratching sticks, so she thought we’d really love this.

And did we ever. We used that sucker all the time. We’d even take turns over who got to sleep with it at night.

So the afternoon when TC came waltzing in, asking in that loud, super scary voice he had “just what THE HELL are you using?!” we were paralyzed with fear.

And confusion.

I mean, duh, we’re getting back massages here. Can’t you leave us alone. No way could we get in trouble for that.

Except. This lovely back massager … guess what. Wasn’t a massager.

It was a vibrator. Yes, you read this correctly. Granny gave us a f-ing vibrator!

A vibrator! That we used all the time! Not there, weirdos, on our backs.

This is still one of my favorite Granny stories … my first vibrator, at such a young, tender age. Explains a lot, doesn’t it?

Being the good father that he was/is, it wasn’t until years later, when it came up during conversation, that the awesome back massager – whatever happened to that anyway?

Oh yeah, we got rid of it. Had to hide it from you guys. We didn’t want our children turning into porn stars. Or sex addicts.

And look at us now — two for two. Not bad.