Cootchie-Cootchie-Coo!


“Don’t you want me baby?”

--Human League


I met someone today. I’m sure I broke Olympic records getting home to blog about it.

My father discovered he needed a refill on his cholesterol medication, so he dispatched me to the Walmart with instructions to pick up a few other sundries like vitamin-D and some corn plasters. While I was waiting for his prescription to be filled, I sat next to a heavy, slightly sweaty, balding man with glasses of about 35. He was reading a pamphlet about psoriasis (which he didn’t appear to have, at least not on the parts of him that were visable). He turned to me, flashed a smile and said, “Hello!”

“Hi,” I said. After all, I’m a friendly, agreeable person.

“Do you have psoriasis?”

I thought this was an odd thing to lead off with, but said, “No.”

"Neither do I,” he declared, tossing the pamphlet aside (leaving me to wonder what kind of opening that was). “How long have you lived here?”

I assumed he didn’t mean in the Walmart. “About ten years.”

He smiled. “I’m new.”

I knew that he was about to ask me the traditional “new-guy-on-the-block” questions such as where the best Chinese food was, which dry-cleaner wouldn’t shred his pants and what bars to avoid, so I tried to summon up some enthusiasm for my town. However, in another four seconds, all of my travelogue information was driven from my mind. “It’s so hard to meet people,” he said, slightly sadly. “And I have an especially hard time. Because of…well, because of the lifestyle.”

I wish I could say that there was a swelling of dramatic danger music, but there wasn’t. He very obviously wanted to ask me about his “lifestyle,” and when I didn’t right away he added, quickly, “Oh, no, it’s nothing too weird or perverted or anything. Let me give you our website address. He proceeded to dig in his wallet and handed me a card, which simply listed this website.  (But don’t click on it yet. Wait for it. It’s worth it).

“What is this?” I asked curiously, examining the card.

“I’m an AB,” he said, in an explanatory tone.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what that is,” I admitted, wondering if I really wanted to get into it.

He cleared it all up for me. “I’m an Adult Baby.”

There was a moment of silence.

“It’s not as uncommon as you’d think,” he went on, hastily. I was about to tell him I didn’t think anything about Adult babies, but apparently having gathered courage from my not screaming and running away yet, he continued. “We’re really misunderstood. A lot of people think we’re pedophiles or like to have sex with children, and we don’t do or want anything like that.”

I began to wonder what was taking so long with my dad’s medication. He kept explaining: “See, we like to be treated as babies. We sleep in cribs, drink from bottles, and wear diapers.”

I started looking around for Rod Serling. “Okay,” I said, fascinated.

Obviously feeling he had found a sympathetic ear, he continued. “The diapers are really expensive, actually. Personally, I like the Wellness Briefs Adult Baby Plastic Pants. I get them from eBay because they’re really discreet.”

“Well, they’d have to be,” I said, nodding sympathetically.

He was obviously frustrated. “If only people would try it before they judged it!” He said. “It’s such a comforting, reassuring lifestyle. We’re gentle, passive people. We’re not hurting anyone.”

“Of course not,” I said, trying to be soothing. And with that, I realized I had gone too far in my empathy.

He paused, then began, hopefully, “I don’t suppose you’d—“

“No.”

“No, really, if you’d just—“

“No.”

“Well, do you know anyone who’d like to—“

“No.”

“Will you please at least go to the website?” He seemed so desperate.

And then, like a blessed deus ex machina, the pharmacist yelled my dad’s name.

(You can go to the website now.  You're welcome).