“Daddy, why do girls like stripping?”
This was the first question my daughter, Naja, decided to ask me one morning as we were rushing to get out the door and, on our way to school. The question seemed strange as she had just woken up and I don’t remember talking about strippers in front of her any time recently, but as children her age are wont to do, when she has a question, it needs an answer.
I considered the question as carefully as one could while racing through the neighborhood because there was only two minutes left before they would be considered tardy, weaving between Teslas of varying colors; a sea of black, white, and midnight silver amongst the bubble-shaped cars. I thought of answering her in a way that would satisfy the requirements within the virtue signaling handbook, but then thought better of it. Naja wasn’t interested in a politically correct answer. She wanted to know the benefits of stripping…and I was interested in making it seem as unattractive as possible.
“They do it for money,” I responded mindlessly as I tapped my fingers impatiently on the steering wheel. A signature red Tesla model 3 had cut in front of me and we were stopped on the road, waiting to turn into the school parking lot. We were all waiting for a mother and son to walk across so the rest of us could rush in.
Naja gasped. “Money? How much money?!”
I think I made a mistake.
“Oh, not much. The actually have to do it because someone is making them.”
“Is it because they want to have S – E – X? Do they take off all the clothes so that people can see their nipples?”
My kids have been taught that the word “sex” is a bad word, just like how other families would identify words like “fuck”, “bitch”, “cocksucker”, or “broccoli” as off-limits bad words. So instead of saying it, they spell it out in hopes that they can avoid any form of retribution for not actually saying the word.
This doesn’t seem to be going in the direction that I want it to. I figure it might be time to go in a different direction.
“How do you even know about all of this? Is your friend Gemma telling you about this?”
“Noooo. She doesn’t know anything about stripping. I did tell her about it and she had the same questions that I do. So how much money do they get for stripping?”
“I don’t know. Maybe a few hundred or thousand of dollars a night?”
I looked in the rearview mirror and could see Naja’s eyes widen in amazement. Perhaps I should stop pulling answers out of my ass and just shut up.
“Daddy, what if they have S – E – X? Do they get more money?”
I’m glaring a hole through the back of the same red Tesla Model 3 in front of me. The fucker hasn’t moved, I’m guessing because she’s looking at her phone, oblivious to the fact that other people have to get to work and would prefer their kids have perfect attendance. “Yes,” I absent-mindedly respond.
“Even more money!?!?”
Uh-oh.
I remain silent as Naja starts debating the benefits of stripping with Isaac, who this whole time has not said a word. The concept of women stripping didn’t interest him, but the concept of earning money, and a lot of it, for any sort of activity got him engaged. The Tesla ahead finally starts moving as I’m still contemplating whether to honk at her and suffer the wrath of her hateful glare after we both drop the kids off. I follow closely and once in the drop-off zone, I turn around to the kids while Naja is yelling out “I want to be a stripper when I grow up.”
“Get out! Go! You’re late!” I yell at the kids as they start picking up all their stuff and unbuckling their seat belts. “And stop talking about stripping. I don’t want to get a call from your principal.”
Naja pauses in thought for a second, then decides to ask one last question.
“Daddy, what is S – E – X like?”
I’m sitting there, wishing Isis were present to field the question. She usually knows what to say in these types of situations where as I tend to make things worse.
“Remember when you had to take the COVID test this last weekend?”
Naja’s eyes opened wide. We were notified last week that Naja had been in close proximity to another student that had tested positive for COVID. It had been running rampant through Naja’s class recently. This last weekend, we had to take her to a community center for testing. It was a traumatic experience for both her and I. She had to have the Q-tip shoved far up her nose, farther than her finger has ever traveled, while I had to hold her arms, head, and body down like some mad child in an asylum as she screamed at the top of her lungs. A birthday party was going on nearby, but everyone at that party had turned to watch as Naja screamed bloody murder as the tester “picked her nose” for her. Even after it was over, Naja continued crying for a good ten minutes longer. I could see the look of terror in her eyes as she relived the experience in her mind.
This was my opportunity to kill the idea of a stripping future for her, or at the very least, to turn her off of sex for a good while.
“S – E – X is just like taking a COVID test. Get out of the car! You’re late! Have fun at school! Love you!”
2 thoughts on ““Why do girls like stripping?””
Comments are closed.