The Vasectomy Dialogues: A Vas Was Severed, But a Bond Was Created

(Trigger warning: The following content references balls. And by balls, I mean testicles, gonads, testes, or more commonly known as nuts, cojones, rocks, or bollocks. If you, or someone you love, suffers from balls, you might consider skipping these essays. You’ve been warned.)

“So, is this your way of telling me you like dudes?” My wife asked me.

“What?! No!!” I stuttered and then repeated, “What?!? No!!!”

Notice the quadruple questions formation to challenge my wife’s doubts about my sexual orientation and identity.

“I just don’t understand,” she continued. “Why are you listening in on someone’s vasectomy? It’s weird.”

“I just don’t understand what there is to understand.” I retorted. “Why can’t a bro support another bro at his moment of biggest vulnerability? He has to bare his balls to someone and then get an injection in them, and then someone is going to burn his innards, and I get to listen to it, whimpering and all???” I said a little too excitedly.

“How did you even meet this guy?”

“It’s Chris. I told you I met him on the internet. I found his articles, told him I liked his writing, and he told me he liked mine. Then he said that we were like soul brothers.”

Which we are; Christopher Robin and I are brothers from different mothers. We are basically the same person, but he is white and tall and grew up somewhere in Pittsburgh or Scranton. I don’t know exactly where, but it is definitely dark and wet and sad. Basically, it’s somewhere dreadful.

“I don’t know. This sounds like he is catfishing you.” My wife said, clearly disturbed by it all.

“What would he catfish me about? It’s not like I’m going to give him my social security number just because he invited me to share this intimate, life-altering moment with him.”

“Besides, who would make up an entire vasectomy to catfish anyone? That’s ridiculous.”

I did meet Chris online.

Writing online can be a dreary enterprise.

Anyone with a desire to write that they can’t seem to get rid of can turn to a digital writing platform to share their art. However, writing sites are extensions of every single social media platform. It is doom and gloom, the highlight reels or people hustling you for money and status, promising paradise while belittling your life.

So, all of that, but with words. So even more dreadful. Kinda like whatever depressing city Chris grew up in.

When I found Chris, I was ready to give up on my online writing journey until I found his article, “The Averagest Unsuperpower.” The essay was a series of anecdotes about how average he is.

You have to understand that the fact the algorithm fed me that essay was a miracle. Most of the stuff in my feed comes from one of two camps.

1. “The world is burning, so we should light ourselves on fire and scream at our neighbors and people who can’t do anything about it.” Think of the protesters shutting down the Golden Gate Bridge for hours, throwing their car keys to the cold Bay water, and accomplishing nothing other than making a bunch of commuters, who feel bad about Gaza but can’t do anything about it, really late and, simultaneously, fearing for their lives and an earthquake
2. “Here is how to make money online. Sign up for my course so I can reveal the secrets of how to make money.” The “secret,” according to these gurus, to making money is creating seminars telling people that the way to make money is finding people to buy their seminars, telling people how to make money, and on and on the scamming wheels they go. Think Trump University or similar educational enterprises of almost no societal value.

So, finding a personal story that was funny but vulnerable and poignant was a godsend. I honestly believe that had I not found that article, my writing journey would have looked a lot different. So, he is to blame for all the damage I’ve done to the art and craft of writing.

“What the fuck do you want?” It’s his opening line every time I call him.
“You are such a charming asshole.” I fire back.

Chris and I have, at different times, worked on projects together. But our latest project had us bonding even deeper. Who knew two dudes could bond over balls so hard?

One day, we talked about how I often found myself in the middle of vasectomy dialogues. Many of my friends are at this stage in life, and I asked Chris to edit the first piece in the series. The first piece turned out to be a larger project, and so far, it ended with me having a virtual front-row seat to listen to his vasectomy.

That day, we finished the conversation regarding a different essay, he announced, “By the way, I’m getting a vasectomy next Wednesday.”

“Great. I should interview you right after to get you at your most vulnerable.”

“You should interview me during.”

Silence. I was speechless, mostly because I was calculating how weird this experience would be versus how great the story could be.

“Are you serious? I’m not scared. I cut both my kids placents into little cubes. I’m not grossed out by medical procedures. I’m in.”

“Great. I’m in, too.”

Chris and I getting feedback from each other on writing projects looks a lot like Johnny Knoxville and Steve-O from “Jackass” discussing stunts. “So we just used this industrial stapler to staple our balls? No problem!”

I spent days in a daze, deciding whether or not I would do this. But I knew I needed to do it for science. Did I say science? I meant education. Did I say education? I meant entertainment for the masses. Did I say masses? I meant me. My own entertainment. And Chris’, my white brother from another baller.

“It would be 4:30 am your time.”

“I don’t care. It’s your vasectomy. I’ll be there to support you and to collect material.”

It was early, but not earlier than I typically would wake up. If he would’ve said three in the morning, I would’ve responded, “Forget it. There is a limit to what a writer will do; being in a friend’s vasectomy is not one of them.”

But luckily, 4:30 in the morning was the time for the things I could accomplish.

I woke up early and headed to my garage.

I kept the lights off to keep the ambient in line with the mood of the moment. I found a place in the garage futon between the bottles of lime-scented all-purpose cleaner and the two buckets of give-gallon eggshell white paint.

I sat down and pulled up my hoodie to keep things creepy, which also helped me manage my reservations about this procedure even though I wasn’t the one getting a gigantic needle in my beans.

I put my earbuds in, and I dialed Chris’s number.