The tiny fragments of affection I had for this species, the draw, has really elevated recently. As a certified weirdo, I had seen their form as an ideal that fit certain sockets in the grey matter.

In a quest to understand the species for a story I've been writing, I've expected to find brutal monsters, both in practice of day life and mating. Quick, universally understood brutal mating that ends up just being a disappointing shitshow (see bovines and cervidae)

Instead they are complex. Very courtship oriented, and more over, anatomically mysterious. Mysterious enough that there are scientists (plural, note) that are writing papers (plural, note) stabbing guesses with expensive medical equipment trying to understand what that gator dick do. It's fascinating and, frustrating, because we don't know what exactly it does, and can only theorize how it even comes out.

How do you purvey something so complicated to a layperson? What liberties do you take with anthromorpholgy to a biological construct intriguing? Be easy to write it under the rug with a half human member down there.

I don't know. I'm over my cold/covid/black death now probably... will be a busy day... A tree to remove from a house and tin to hang on a steel building...