Foreskins! So simple and obvious, yet so complex!
So there's not giving a moment's thought to circumcising your kid.
There's thinking about it and wondering, "Holy smokes, why would I cut off this guy I just barely met's penis without his permission?"
And then there's taking your kid's year-old foreskin out to Prospect Park and burying it under a tree, and then drawing a map to that tree, so that when the kid's 30 or so, and getting married, he can visit that tree and--without getting caught by the Parks Department, hopefully--cut down some branches from that tree to make his chuppah.
In both the print and spoken word version of the story, Peter Hyman says that it was the mohel's idea, but I am sure Shel Silverstein is involved somehow. A buried foreskin would explain a lot about that awful book.
Peter Hyman, The Moth OMG Stories.mov [themoth/youtube via DT reader Elizabeth]
Jewish Body Week| Stumped, by Peter Hyman [tabletmag.com]
