Son, It’s About Time I Explained How Mommy Got the Zika Virus

Dear Craig,

It’s Daddy. I’m writing this letter since you don’t want to talk to me right now, but I want to let you know what happened to Mommy to get her sick with the Zika virus. It’s hard to explain, since you’ve yet to hit puberty (a day I hope never comes), but I think it’s finally time I gave you the “Birds and the Mosquitoes” talk.

Sometimes when a daddy bird is working in Venezuela to help provide essential medical supplies to people who are really poor (like your friend Seamus!), he gets bitten by a mosquito.

Do you remember when a mosquito bit you last summer while we were helping the police search the swamps for Grandpa Hank’s body? Remember how you got an itchy bump, and I told you not to scratch? This Venezuelan mosquito gave the daddy bird more than just an itchy bump— it also transmitted the Zika virus, which the World Health Organization has now declared an epidemic.

Now, the Daddy Bird didn’t realize he had the Zika virus. He was too busy thinking about how he was going to make epic love to the Mommy when he got home. And Craig, that Daddy Bird and and Mommy went at it hard, like that scene in The Notebook, but hotter and dryer, because we live in Dallas. Turns out that Daddy Bird didn’t just give Mommy the night of her life (her words, not mine). He also gave her the Zika virus, because Mommy has an IUD, and neither participants knew it could be transmitted through sexual contact.

In case you didn’t realize it yet, son, that Daddy Bird is me, Daddy. Please don’t have nightmares.

The good news is that Mommy should be fine. The doctor told Daddy that as long as Mommy isn’t pregnant, there shouldn’t be any serious medical issues. Luckily, after seeing how you turned out, we decided you don’t need any brothers or sisters, and I thank Mommy’s IUD every day for being a gift from God.

I hope that helps explain what’s going on with Mommy. When she gets better, I will explain to you why Grandpa Hank was found dead in a swamp with a poem called “Rub-a-Dub-Dub, Grandpa Had a Serious Gambling Debt.”

Love,

Daddy

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Tony McNamara (@faketonymac) currently performs with Dumptruck, part of The Second City Training Center’s Severn Darden Graduate Program. He hates mosquitoes.