"You'll Freeze Your A$$ Off"

Ever wonder if your children are really listening to you?  One way to know, for certain, is to sprinkle some profanity into your quality family time.

              Quality family time for the Masters= the 8 1/2 minute drive to Target

To be even more specific...During our 8 1/2 minutes of quality family time, the conversation topics usually include accusations of favoritism, reviews of previously denied requests, and general complaints of recent and past decisions.  Most of our conversations are either suggestions of how I can improve their quality of life or evaluations of my parental performance.  It's as if I am moonlighting as some entry level Customer Service representative.   

Tuesday night, Chris (fellow Customer Service rep.) and I found ourselves justifying a trip to Target.  Apparently, our seven-year-old and nine-year-old had more pressing matters to attend to.  Heaven forbid they miss seeing episode 28 of Wizards of Waverly Place, which they know by heart, for the eleventy-seventh time.  As we turned into the parking lot, a whiny voice came from the backseat.  "Can we stay in the car?" 

Mother of the year replied, "You'll freeze your a$$ off!"

The girls have heard plenty of cuss words cross my lips, but I'm pretty sure this was the first time I fired one directly at them.  The first one to respond was Abby...

"Mama, said a$$.  Can I say a$$, too?  I promise I'll just say a$$ in the Jeep and not say a$$ in front of other people?"

If you know Abby, then you know she tried to get in as many a$$es as she could before I was able to regain control.  I must admit, she nailed it.   Her slight pause before each "a$$" was masterful, and her production of the /s/ sound would put a smile on the face of any speech teacher.  She's a natural.

To be fair, I am not the sole source of explicit language.  One of our family's favorite sing along songs is "Toes" by the Zac Brown Band.  Chris granted the girls special permission to sing all the words as long as the words "stay in his truck".  If you are not familiar with the song, the first line goes like this:

I've got my toes in the water,
a$$ in the sand,
not a worry in the world,
a cold beer in my hand,
life is good today
life is good today

I don't care who you are...hearing a seven-year-old belt out that song is just plain funny.  What is even more humorous is the nine-year-old sitting next to her.  Henley is the singer in the family.  She is also our strict rule follower.  She will sing along with us, but she will not say a$$.

Gone are the days when we could safely launch a bad word into the air without little ears hearing.  We can't even spell the words, that just makes cussing educational.  The girls know cuss words.  I adore the fact that our girls think the "s" word means "stupid", the "d" word means "dumb" and the granddaddy of cuss words is "s-u".  That's right.  I don't want my kids to say shut-up, but we sing together about a$$es and beer.

I should probably not admit this since I am an adult (not to mention a teacher), but I enjoy the occasional use of profanity.  It's therapeutic.  It's cleansing.  In some situations, my feelings cannot be adequately expressed with an "Aw, shucks" or an "Oh, poo".  I simply cannot call the driver of the car two centimeters from my back bumper a "poo-head".  I cannot describe the neighbor with supersonic hearing as a "witch".  Dropping a large McDonald's sweet tea in my lap on the way to school, cannot be properly punctuated with a "son of a gun".

I distinctly remember the first time I heard my own mother pepper the air with profanity.  I remember laughing......then running.  While she doesn't cuss often, she does cuss consistently, and she keeps it contained to the kitchen.  She taught me everything I know about cooking.  Her recipe for southern fried okra calls for 1 cup cornmeal, 2 Tablespoons milk, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon black pepper and half a dozen dammits. 

I'm sure the days of the "s" word and the "d" word will soon be gone.  Soon, I will be a "b", and life will be living "h-e-double hockey sticks". 

But....
Life is good today.



To those of you I've offended......I'm surprised it's taken me this long.
To my sweet grandmothers......Chad cusses, too.
To my wonderful boss......I swear I avoid using profanity in my lesson plans. 
To my parents......I still look around before I use the word "crap" and I usually whisper it.
To our dog, Baxter......truth is, your mom really is a bitch.