Den Mother

I've had a couple of comments about the note in my profile about being a den mother for my three male roomies. This coupled with the mention of "From the top rope!" in the latest post makes me think that perhaps I should address the bizarre, sometimes-abusive and yet fulfilling relationship I have with "the boys."

When speaking the words "The Boys," the phrase sometimes includes me (I'm mostly OK with this, considering that a). I live with them and b). I've never really been considered one of the girls), when being used by outside-the-house sources, but for this post, will define the three males in my home: Josh, Puck and Kobold. Yes, I realize that 2/3 of those names don't really make a whole lot of sense. We'll not cover that and just say that it's a long story. Moving on!

It's not that I'm necessarily a den mother so much as I am the little shoulder-angel for the boys and mostly it's the fact that I still have the sensibilities of a Midwesterner and I'm enough of a giant wuss to worry about them when they do stupid things like contemplate a barfight or decide to go marauding down on the strip to terrorize the tourists.

An excerpt from a conversation last night:

"Yanno, in Nevada, so long as it's not concealed, it's legal to carry a weapon."

"Dude! We should totally take our swords next time we go down to the strip!"

. . . this sort of thing begs "Rabbit intervention" which generally means distracting them by some other idea that is equally fun but has a much lower chance of landing any one of us in the Clark County detention center.

I have known Kobold for nearly 9 years now; he's dated my best friend, I've lived with him before and we generally get on pretty well unless somehow I've failed him and he's bored. It's a bad thing when Kobold gets bored, mostly because this means that Rabbit (that's me) has to entertain him in some fashion or she ends up twisted up like a pretzel, bruised or some other such silliness. Rule for Kobold: Don't let him get bored

Puck I met a few years ago at a renn event. He and I get on very well indeed and while he doesn't share the "entertain me, I'm bored" symptoms that Kobold does, he is a big fan of WWE (or whatever the hell organization it is) wrestling and every now and then decides that I'm a good practice dummy when it comes to submission holds. Needless to say this is also no good and usually ends with me begging him to stop digging his bony elbows into my softer parts.

Josh is the third roommate, and up until recently, the one that I've had the least amount of interaction with because he worked wonky hours. That's remedied for the moment, which means that generally speaking we get to spend more time together. He's the quieter but no less devious combination of the other two. Generally, he's more laid back and definitely less prone to getting me into some sort of compromising position that involves me screaming "Pants stay on the Rabbit!"

That being said, I'll add in here that I love my roommates dearly. They take care of me, they make sure I'm safe and we have a good time together. When I try and describe our dynamic, mostly it comes down to "perverted brothers." Being that I found out that Kobold and I are somehow related back in the far branches of our family tree, it's more true than I probably am even aware of.

We're all giant perverts, which means sexual innuendo and threats run amok in the house, but I am and always have been just fine with that. Most girls would find an environment like this at least ridiculously uncomfortable if not unlivable. To them I say: "Wuss..."

On the subject of them being protective, sometimes it borders on overprotecitve (thus the initial statement that they're like brothers to me) but not in a necessarily bad way. I know they're looking out for my well-being. Because I'm that lovely Midwestern breed of naive, I'm more prone to giving money to bums, helping strangers, talking to random people, etc . . . which in this town can sometimes get a person into trouble - ie: "Why yes, Mr. Homeless Man, I'd love to help you wrangle that bag of empty cans into this dark alley."

Really, most of this is for my own good. I owe each of them a large debt of gratitude for moving me down to Las Vegas from Reno when things went south with my ex-boyfriend. They did it without question and without giving me (much) crap about being a girl and crying when I left my friends up there. I wouldn't trade any of them for anything... except those times when I'm twisted into a position that makes me scream "I'm gonna drown in my own boobs!" It's never a good thing, but I know it's all in fun. They wouldn't pick on me if they didn't care. Clearly, they care a great deal.

Most of all, it's entertaining living with these three. I often find myself wondering how I got into the situation I'm currently in. I mean that in the most immediate sense possible, not in the "gee, where would I be without these guys" but more in the "How the hell did I end up with marshmallow in my hair?" fashion. That's right. Marshmallow in the hair. It's entertaining. We cook, we clean, we go do renn events. Generally it's that weird mid-twenties family that only ever happens in the sitcoms that are moderately popular excepting that the characters are too "out there" to be real. These are the sitcoms that come close to describing my life but are too X-rated even for late night cinemax.

Conclusion: My roommates are a lot of fun, our house is never boring and I'm the little sister/sexy roomie that they'd never actually put the moves on.