solo mama entendre

The other day, I felt like I might have landed on a brilliant invention. An app you can use to have those difficult conversations with your child. Instead of having conversations about drugs, sex, and Donald Trump with your kids, why not just create an app to whom you can delegate that responsibility. I mean, there is an app for practically everything these days.

This flash of brilliance was brought on by my increasing reliance on Siri to engage with my children on challenging topics. Prior to discovering the vast knowledge that Siri possesses, I was trying to answer these difficult, and sometimes, ethically gut-wrenching, questions on my own. Now, when I’m weaving through difficult city traffic trying to make an appointment on time and my son asks me when the sun is going to explode, I just hand my phone back to him. It’s better that way anyhow as I won’t be tempted to respond to texts or check Facebook comments while driving.

Siri is proficient in discovering the biggest anything on Earth. From dinosaurs to trucks to sea monsters and poop. She can also find the smallest house or the oldest man on Earth. I have no doubt that she might have played a crucial role in finding Osama bin Laden.

The other night, when I briefly grabbed my phone from my son to send a text, Siri was in the middle of looking online to find out “what is the biggest boob on the Earth?” He swore up and down that he was saying “poop” and Siri got it wrong. He’s 6 years old, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt.

This morning, as I got out of the shower, I heard my daughter chatting with Siri. She was saying “Show me a picture of a bear eating a man.” I quickly threw on a towel and descended on her, snatching the phone without warning. She would have had nightmares for weeks.

However, it was on the way to church today that I concluded that Siri might truly be the best source of information for our family. My daughter yelped from the backseat that she had just swallowed some gum and asked what would happen. Naturally, I wanted to hand the phone back to her and say, “Here, just ask Siri.” It was here where my PILL, or Partner in Lawful Living (as opposed to Partner in Crime – you can draw whatever conclusions you’d like from the acronym) preempted me. According to him, now that she had swallowed her gum, she had to be very careful whenever she had the urge to pass gas. Should she fart while she was in Church Party, it was very possible that her back-end would blow a bubble, her leggings would expand, and her fart would smell like Juicy Fruit. And it would be embarrassing. My son joined in, full of tips on how to reduce the size, sound and smell of a fart. Apparently, this was not something he had learned from Siri, but had thought up the techniques himself and tested them and they worked. Tried and true.

After witnessing this conversation, I was determined that Siri would have had the edge on answering this question “correctly.” Although I did conclude that in the end, interactions with Siri, my PILL, and my forthcoming app will still all require adult supervision.