Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Parenting Test No. 273

Considering how big a fan of High School Musical our 7-year old daughter, Megan is, my wife and I have worked extra hard at trying to keep all of the latest Vanessa Hudgens news away from her.

Any info, stories, links, discussion about Hudgens and those pictures floating around the net should only be handled by an adult, preferrably, me.

As far as we could tell, Megan hadn't heard anything about the photos, blissfully unaware of the whole controversy. The problem is, that my wife and I can't be with her throughout the entire day. Those darn school kids.

We were sitting at dinner the other night when out of the blue, Megan starts talking about Hudgens. She mentioned that her friend at school told her that Vanessa "took pictures of herself without any clothes on, and sent them to Zac (Efron)." My wife and I took a deep breath, looked at each other with a half smile/half "oh, boy" expression.

We really weren't prepared for her next comment.

"(My friend) was wondering if they had s-e-x."

That's how she said it, too, spelling it out, so she must know that it's something bad or naughty.

Frankly, we didn't ask her if she knew what s-e-x was, or if her friend had told her what it was. After the shock and awe of the question wore off, after our hearts started beating again, and after the realization that "oh, no, our daughter has moved up a rung on the growing up ladder of life" by making her first known reference to sex, we did what we could to abandon the subject.

We honestly had no comeback for what she said. We were not prepared to deal with that topic with a 7-year old. Should we have been? Several times during the rest of the night, my wife would just look at me and say, "She's seven!"

All we ended up telling her was to not talk about it to anyone else because it was no one else's business. It was Vanessa's personal business, not ours. That seemed to work, but again, not being with her all day long makes me wonder what she, or anyone else, has been saying about this whole thing.

As a parent, especially of a girl, hearing her make that first reference to sex, whether she knows what it is or not, doesn't rank up their with other "first" experiences, like the first steps, first words, or even first solid poop.

I realize that it's September in the midwest, and the bees are going to be all over the place here soon. I didn't expect the birds to join them for several years, however.

So, let's just hope that for now, all of this "pics without clothes on", and "s-e-x" talk concerning Vanessa Hudgens, and anyone else for that matter, stays away from our precious little 7-year old. She's way too young to be thinking about any of this stuff.

There's been talk that more pics, and possibly a video or two from Hudgens' past are out there, too, and may make an appearance online soon. Hopefully those things will stay far away from Megan's eyes and ears, and end up where they belong...in my email.

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