Blake Schwendiman's Blog and Blook

Well, you know that our society has changed a lot from when we were kids. Growing up in the seventies and eighties, I don't think we were obsessed with health the way we are today. I'm not saying that it's necessarily a bad thing that we're all so aware of our health and the collective health of our country, I just know that as a kid I didn't really think about it or hear about it very much.

Yesterday I was outside with my daughter (she'll be 9 next week) while she and her friend were playing. They were gathering leaves and flowers and seeds into buckets and then "feeding" them to their stuffed animals. My daughter had her Build-A-Bear Workshop monkey as her child and was commenting on how hungry the monkey was. Her friend then said, "My chipmunk isn't very hungry because he isn't feeling well." My daughter then responded with, "My monkey has a healthy colon."

Naturally, I laughed. I also realized that I wouldn't have been able to have said that same thing when I was nine years old. I'm pretty sure I'd never heard of a colon at that point and I don't think I would have known it should be healthy. So, our health-obsessed society is doing at least one thing right: it's creating a generation of kids that can say really funny things.