My mother owns her own daycare. So she has a lot of very real conversations with parents about their children and their needs. In one of these conversations, perhaps about diaper rash or circumcision healing…or whatever, she said the word penis to one of the mothers.
My mother thought nothing of it but judging by the woman’s reaction, you would have thought she cursed her out.
The woman, a mother well into her thirties, shuddered before asking my mother, “You use that word?” My mother is revered for her frankness…and calling people out for their foolishness.
“What word?”
“…Oooh I can’t even say it…”
“You mean penis?”
“Yes. I just could never say that word.”
Later, when my aunt, my mother’s business partner, heard the story, she said “But I bet she puts her husband’s all up in her mouth.”
That’s the keep it real side of my family.
And as you might imagine, we were taught the proper anatomical terms when it came to speaking about our body parts…and even their functions. From potty training age, my sister and I used the word urinate. Point is, while my parents and extended family members had crude or comical nicknames for genitals, we only learned those after the proper terms had been ingrained in our minds.
So, it was always odd to stumble upon people who didn’t use these terms. I dated a man who, for the first few years of us actually getting to know each other, laughed hysterically, any time the word penis was said aloud.
Though he eventually learned to use the word, in retrospect, his inability to say penis was symbolic of some other maturity issues.
Which brings me to the point at hand. There are some behaviors that may masquerade as odd, insignificant quirks. But nah. Some “quirks” are glaring, red flags.
And if you don’t believe me, you need to look no further than this clip of Rich Dollaz during a recent, radio interview, captured by The Shade Room. He was addressing the rumors that he had sex with fellow “Love and Hip Hop New York,” costar Diamond Strawberry.
If you can’t watch the video right now, Dollaz, with a straight face, says:
“I’m going to tell you what the truth is…but it’s “Love and Hip Hop’s” job to leave it up for the imagination. So I’m not mad at them, but I’m going to tell you the truth and I did not have sex with Diamond Strawberry in the bathroom, contrary to what the world may think. And I wouldn’t lie on my pee pee.”
The room explodes in laughter at hearing a man, in his forties, refer to his penis as “pee pee”…but in the 15-second clip Rich sits there with that same adamant look, still arguing his case.
In fairness, this was only an Instagram clip and perhaps Rich doesn’t make a habit of using the word “pee pee.” Still, the fact that he chose to use it in a room full of men, as if the words don’t immediately elicit images of microscopic man meat, seem to suggest it’s a pattern.
Sigh.
I’m ashamed to say that I used to think Rich was kind of cute. (I really liked the way he expressed his passion for Olivia and wanting her to succeed in her career.) But as the seasons of “Love and Hip Hop” progressed, dude just got worse and worse. He was sleeping with everybody, trying to sabotage all of Erica Mena’s attempts to leave him alone and he mixed business with pleasure one too many times to even front like he was actually about his paper. And that was just his behavior on the show; in real life, he’s so behind on child support, he’s been arrested for it…twice.
If you ask me the fact that Rich calls his penis “pee pee” and is acting like a little boy out here in these streets are directly correlated.
Ladies, be forewarned; if your man can’t say penis, or vagina for that matter, jog, sprint, run or dash away! You’re dealing with a child.
