La Cucaracha

The couch was a place of great learning when I was a kid. At about age four, I developed the habit of watching television in my underwear while fondling my scrotum. It probably awakened some kind of pleasure center, but I can’t actually remember getting off on it.

One day, as I was watching another creepy episode of Dark Shadows I felt a tickling sensation. When I looked down I realized there were roaches in my crotch. I immediately tried to squash one but there was too much pain so I panicked and ran into mama’s room where she napped, “There’s roaches! Roaches! Roaches, mommy!”

“Where, where are there roaches?” She slurred, half-asleep.

“In my balls.”

“Your balls? Let me see...” and so I showed mama my balls. She had to put her glasses on because she couldn’t see anything. The roaches wiggled again and I screamed “There! See! There they are!”

“There’s no roaches.”

“Yes there is, look...this...” and I held between my fingers one of the little insects—it was inside my scrotum and I wanted it out! And how did it get there? Was I not careful, did I not shake my penis properly after peeing and did the roaches, smelling some leftover pee droplets come in through my penis hole to drink my pee?! Or did they crawl in through my butt? Did they make a hole to get in and anesthetize it with special saliva?!

“That’s one of your little balls,” mama said.

“No. THIS is my balls,” I said, stretching the skin of my scrotum, “And that’s a roach!”

Mama assured me that the oval shaped creature moving about inside my skin was in fact a testicle. There were two of them, she pointed out, although she couldn’t explain how they moved, she assured me it was just the way it should be: creepy. Why would God do such a thing as make balls squirm?