In Praise of the F Bomb

When my kids were little, in order to not raise potty mouths, the hub and I decided we needed to clean up our language. Its not that we were constantly swearing, but we realized that the cussin' we did would eventually be regurgitated by our offspring which would be broadcast into the ether at inopportune moments. So we cleaned it up and started sounding like something between a Disney movie and Mother Theresa. We were boring. But very well spoken.

As the kids grew up and discovered that there were cool other words to express anger, frustration, disdain, etc, I explained that - yes, they are just words, but they show a lack of creativity and - no, its not OK to correct Grandma when she uses them. The first time I dropped an f-bomb in their presence I think I made them cry. I even apologized - but I really wasn't sorry - I was f*ckin' pissed!

I discovered along the way that other people didn't share my restraint. Well, maybe around kids but nowhere else. One Sunday, I attended a meeting in my former minister's office. After the meeting ended, I mentioned that something confused me and my minister said "Yeah, that's a real mind f*ck". As I was drinking coffee at the time, I did an actual spit take. The kind you see on TV where somebody drinks something and blows it across the room. Whiles I was cleaning the wall, I said I was sorry, but I really hadn't expected to hear that word in the minister's office on a Sunday morning.

Flash forward to last month. The hub and I were visiting our pseudo family in Las Vegas. They are some of my favorite people and its purely fate that brought us together. The hub's widowed mother married a divorced man after all their kids were grown and everybody just kind of clicked. The sort-of brother has a kinda wife, and they are very cool people. Both journalist types, they are smart, artistic, and well spoken. My nearly sister-in-law also has a mouth that would make a rapper blush. According to her, people aren't dead, they're "tits up in the ground" and f-bombs fly like mosquitoes at dusk when she's comfortable around you. Which, I am happy to say, she is around me and the hub.

In fact, Semi Sis has given me a new mantra by which I intend to structure my whole life. In addition to her other talents, she is a really wonderful and creative cook. All her food is delicious and beautifully presented. One day, she was making a pizza and she was having trouble getting it off the peel (Of course she has a peel - I use a cookie sheet) She ended up folding the pizza in half and turning it into a cobbled together calzone. Ticked off, she carried it to the table, plopped it down and said "F*ck it - its dinner."

This is my favorite new phrase. And its so versatile! Wash the laundry with a red sock?"F*ck it - its clean". Let weeds take over your garden? "F*ck it - its green". Eat a whole bag of chips" "F*ck it - they're gone". I've long thought I needed a personal philosophy and I think I've found it. Thanks to my sorta sister-in-law in Vegas.

I've been thinking a bit about the f-bomb lately. In fact, I've done some research on it. Its an old word of Germanic origin that probably always meant having sex. That's why there's not much information on the origin of the f-bomb; people are shy about stuff like that. Now, though, it means so much more. It adds extremity to things, emphasis...Its a f*cking brilliant word when you think about it!

While writing this, I've kept my friends of tender sensibilities in mind by masking the f-bomb. That's another thing I've discovered - you have your nice friends and your f*cking friends. Your nice friends are people you can have coffee or lunch with, talk about your kids, and shop sometimes. Your fucking friends, you can do all the same stuff with, but you loosen up with these people, and they tend to be a lot more fun. There is frequently chocolate involved with your f*cking friends.

So, I've decided that its OK to drop the occasional f-bomb. In fact, it adds color and depth to my vocabulary. Not in the way Mrs. Metz, my English teacher, would have wanted - but it works for me. And as for this blog entry, f*ck it - its done...