The Bigmouth Frog Joke

My older sister Story was a very bright child.

Borderline prodigy, it turns out. She skipped kindergarten and took most elementary school classes in the attic, by herself. She could spell her name and sing (and write) entire songs when she was 2 years old, but her best trick at the time was the bigmouth frog joke.

She told this joke to everybody. She knew how to be charming about it, too. Soft little blonde curls and bright, shining blue eyes. People loved it. They loved her. She tried to teach it to me, pass it on like a family trade, but I couldn't do it like she did. No one could. The joke is a legacy.

At dinner the other night, my sister was at work and my stepdad was gone, and it was just my mom and the kids and I. We were eating corn and vaguely burnt sweet potatoes, and my mother said to my five-year-old sister, out of the blue, "Hey, do you wanna show Shady the joke I taught you today?"

It was surprising, that she still taught her kids frivolous things like jokes. But there was my little sister, stuffing corn in her mouth, saying in the incredibly loud voice that can only come from the fourth out of five children, "Okay. So. Um. There was a frog, and she said -- 'HI I'M A BIGMOUTH FROG AND I DON'T HAVE ANY BABIES!'"

"No, it goes, 'Mother Bigmouth Frog didn't know what to feed her babies."

"Oh. HAHA! Okay. So, um, mother bigmouth frog did not know what to feed her babies. And she said -- um, so she went to a, um. A, um."

Like I said, no one could tell this joke like Story.

"Let me tell it," my mom said. My mother's parenting involves little involvement and few hugs, but it works well. (Correction: used to. There have been noticeably more hugs recently, or at least since Martensen showed up in a suit and taught the kids how to hold hands.) Her sentimentality is usually well-hidden, but in this case, I was reminded that she does have the same heart and memory I have. And I realized, as she told the joke to the table of messy eaters, if her heart were a pie chart of all that she cares about most tenderly, there would be a substantial section reserved for this joke alone.

"Mother Bigmouth Frog," she began softly, "didn't know what to feed her babies. So she went to the fish! And she said," she cleared her throat, looked at my brother out of the corner of her eye, and, opening her mouth as wide as possible, stretching the words over each other, said, "HI, MISTER FISH! WHAT DO YOU FEED YOUR BABIES?"

My brother, always the slapstick comedian, collapsed out of his chair. The girls laughed, and my mom ignored him. "The fish said, 'I feed my babies moss from the bottom of the pond.' And the bigmouth frog thought, I don't want to feed my babies moss, so she hopped away. Then, she went to the..."

"Turtle?" I said, leaning on my elbow, waiting for it to be over. I knew this joke better than anything I had ever been taught. It was my alphabet song, first ten numbers, how to spell my name.

"Yes! Mother Bigmouth Frog went to the turtle. And she said..." my brother braced himself, "...'HI, MISTER TURTLE! WHAT DO YOU FEED YOUR BABIES?'" My mother is very good at this joke. The boy fell under the table, his sisters erupted into giggles, and the joke continued. "The turtle said, 'I feed my babies little crawdads.'"

"Turtles eat lettuce," I interrupted. She frowned.

"No one asked. SO," she turned to the kids, "the bigmouth frog thought, I don't want to feed my babies little crawdads. So, she went to the..." leaning forward, eyebrows raised, "crocodile. And she said, 'HI, MISTER CROCODILE! WHAT DO YOU FEED YOUR BABIES???" The question was quieter this time, equally big-mouthed, and my brother was too enthralled to remember his self-appointed cue. "And the crocodile said..." Her voice wasn't lowered comically like it was for the fish and the turtle. This time it was just her own, quiet and cool and eerily dangerous. "'I feed my babies bigmouth frogs.'

"And the bigmouth frog said..." Her mouth closed around itself, a tiny pinhole just big enough to release the small, high-pitched words, "Oh. Thank you very much."

The kids laughed and laughed, pounding the table, mouths full of corn. I frowned at the plate, contemplating. "Wait..." I said, old gears beginning to turn.

They looked at me.

And, for the first time in all my life, it clicked into place. I dropped the fork. "OH! THE BIGMOUTH FROG WAS TALKING WITH A SMALL MOUTH TO DISGUISE HERSELF FROM BEING A BIGMOUTH FROG SO THE CROCODILE WOULDN'T EAT HER!"

The kids stopped laughing. The two-year-old looked disappointed. "Wait," my mom said. "You mean all this time, you didn't get the joke?"

"NO! I just thought it was funny because your mouth did that funny thing! I DIDN'T THINK THERE WAS AN INTELLIGENCE TO IT!"

She turned to my brother. They were still laughing. "Toby, did you get it?"

"Uhh, yeah." My brother is barely above average. This is below average for my mom, dad, sister, and I. Plus he does really stupid stuff all the time, like light things on fire and stick the hose in the heating vent. And he has the kind of social skills that got him shanked in the neck with a pencil twice in kindergarten. I didn't believe him.

"At least I was smart enough not to get STABBED in KINDERGARTEN."

But by then everyone was laughing, loud, big-family laughs of spewed corn and uneaten sweet potatoes. My mother rolled her eyes and the dog climbed out from under the table, waiting for plates to clean. "Story should've been here. This was a very big moment. My life has come full circle. The stars have aligned."

Even though my moments of revelation only ever remind me how behind I am in the world, it feels good to finally get it, you know? To realize stuff for yourself, even if it's already been realized before. To hold the air still and line up the world in words. And it's nice to be reminded that my mother cares a lot more than the average person, though she hides it more than most, and it's nice to hear children laugh as the dog eats more sweet potatoes than anyone I've ever known.