| While riding as a passenger in a car the other day, I was jarred by an unexpected speed bump and exclaimed "Goddamn", as I am (at the least) wont to do at any significant provocation. The driver bit my head off for it (exclaiming "That didn't hurt you!"), apparently forgetting for a minute what decades have passed since the 1950's when nobody except auto mechanics (like my father) ever said bad words. I'm not in favor of teaching "bad language" to children, but anybody who can drive a goddamn car is way too old and experienced (I would have thought) to try to crush me for that particular sin.
I have to admit that I'm an extremist. I cuss a lot and I do so emphatically, most especially when I'm alone or think no one's close enough to hear me rant. But I wonder about the driver's statement that the sudden bump "didn't hurt" me. True enough. But the truth is that the only way I could avoid such neurotic automatic responses would be if I were someone else or if I were taking powerful pills (don't I take enough already?) for my nerves. I would need some pretty serious dope. I don't like to be startled!
I am pretty constantly tensed up in expectation of some surprise, pain, or shock, whether it be an expectation of pain in my back from leaning over to pick up objects or the fear that objects I need to move will be too heavy or the dread that a four year old boy will rush at me in fun and knock me off balance and onto my ass! Don't laugh--when his older sister was young, she knocked me down in just that way and it was both difficult and embarrassing to get myself picked up again. You may think those fears are pathetic; I certainly do--but it's the condition my life's been in for a few years now and I don't know how to fix it so that I couldn't possibly offend someone's sensibilities. Well, I could kill myself, but surely no act of Harikiri is required here! If there's a problem, just bugger off, and let me do the same! |
Trying to please others when there is in fact no pleasure in me is something that just never works.
ReplyDeleteI wish I was embarrassed when I hear swearing like I was back in the 50's. The world was such a better place then...emotionally speaking. However, we've all hardened our hearts to a lot of things...things we no longer call sin.
ReplyDeleteI think you may have a "rose-colored" pair of glasses on about the 50's. In any case, that's a peculiar thing for you to find attractive.
ReplyDeletep.s. It was a sin to kill a mockingbird, and may still be. The rest of the so-called sins were kinda bullshit!
ReplyDeleteI have really tried to curb my language and it is taking all I have. With my 11 yo son dropping the F Bomb at school a few weeks ago, I am trying hard to be a better example - but I am certainly not perfect!
ReplyDeleteI suspect you'd do just as well to teach the boy to discern between the fools at school and the people who aren't so uptight about mere words. Remember, we were expected to never say "damn" out loud before Rhett Butler made it all right and no one in the 1950's could say "toilet paper" or "sanitaty napkin" or "condom". Go far enough backk and humans weren't allowed to refer to table "legs" in mixed company. The people who make the rules of society are always such gibbering idiots!
ReplyDeleteActually, I was proud of him. He is usually so mild mannered around others, I was happy to see feisty, but I couldn't really admit it!
ReplyDeleteAll I know is I was raised in the South and saw people fuss over the backyard fence a few times, however, it wasn't until we moved north for a summer that I heard people cussing each other...and, in front of women.
ReplyDeleteThat mindset moved slowing south until it's common place most places today...however, I still think it is more prevalent in the north.
Your neighborhood may be different...after all, you live there!
What comes out of your mouth illustrates your true character.
mUSHY, I don't even know what you're getting at unless it's just that you're becoming a prude in your old age and wish that others were, too. It's all too virtuous for me.
ReplyDeleteOh nothing...got to go watch Mad Men now.
ReplyDeleteMad Men is good, though I wouldn't want to live there.
ReplyDeleteThat was the time of my life and I studied to go into that field, but fate/God had something else in mind.
ReplyDeleteTurned out well though.
Nowadays I find it difficult to carry on a conversation without dropping the F-bomb. Even when I'm just talking to myself.
ReplyDeleteDebbie: me, too, obviously!
ReplyDelete