What the Motherish?

I have a confession. I have the mouth of a truck driver. To me, there is really nothing better than a well-placed expletive to really get your point across. Don’t get me wrong, I do have boundaries, but mostly because I don’t like the way words sound rather than their meanings. I also don’t like calling people these names directly, I would much rather refer to their behavior than them as a person. That way I can still feel like the classy lady I am.

I find movies such as Superbad or Knocked Up funny and simultaneously offensive because of their cheap use of such powerful words. You don’t have to say it 50 times in a sentence to get your point across. That just makes you seem trashy. But really, what’s better than good old “What the (expletive of choice)!” to express yourself?

I have gotten creative over the years as a way to control my Tourette’s-like urges and have successfully, at times, busted out with: What the farfegnugen? What the hummerheffer? What the gosh darn heckelbells? What the motherish?? And then there are the wonderful standbys of freak, freakin, funk, funkin, be-atch, biznotch and such to get me through the really sticky situations, but I’ll be the first to admit that my innocent little children have been subjected to hearing their beloved Mommy’s potty mouth, especially when suffering travesties such as being cut off in traffic, or burning dinner, or seeing yet another mess…

Having married a man who is equally, if not more, enthusiastically fond of such linguistic stylings, our children actually have a rather well-formed vocabulary of their own. It started out small, so we didn’t really realize it. A child would drop something and start muttering, “dimmit”, which we would politely ignore, because really, who wouldn’t be saying that in their situation? It then progressed to the occasional “s#!t”, which too was ignored, if not secretly applauded for using it in a grammatically correct way. And then they brought out the big dog: the f-bomb.

At first, this too did not really faze us because it’s just words, right? They’re going to learn them anyway, right? Turns out there is something really creepy about your entourage of kids sitting in the back of the car screaming “F**K” in the back seat as you’re trying to drive home during rush hour traffic. Especially when it’s done with such intensity that you start truly wishing you were religious so you knew someone to perform an exorcism before they started spewing split pea soup everywhere because there is nothing in the world you hate more than split pea soup.

But I digress… so, how did we deal with this conundrum? Did we lay the smack down and become dictators who took away their right to free speech? Nope. We sat them down and had a deep discussion about when, where and how to use those words appropriately and helped them to understand that not everyone appreciates words in all their glory the way we do. The result? We now have children who are very well versed in the art of cursing, but are constantly monitoring our behavior and never engage in it themselves (aside from the occasionally asking Morty or George to say “fork” for a cheap giggle.)

In short, they are oppressive in their prevention of my God-given right to express myself for their desire to be something their dad and I never imagined being: “proper”. Ugh. What a dirty word in itself. I’m starting to think that taking the mystery and taboo nature of things away from kids is one of the best ways to make them lose interest in it. By allowing them to try things out and giving them a thorough explanation, they are simply no longer interested. It’s become a silly parent thing that is beneath them, which is fine and dandy for me because it saves me the trouble of explaining to other parents why Billy/Becky/Timmy/Tommy came home from a play date screaming, “What the mother s#!t is wrong with you?!” when his/her Zhu Zhu pets won’t turn off.

So, I guess I’m proud of my kids for having better social boundaries than me, but I still secretly hope that they don’t bow to the pressure to conform to those who deem themselves “normal” in society. Instead, I hope that as they mature they will find ways to express themselves that they are comfortable with…or at least learn to be more comfortable with the way I express myself. Otherwise our future holidays are going to be hummerheffin painful. Just sayin’.

Betsey Matas lives in Minneapolis, MN and is patiently waiting for the hummerheffin winter to end before her 5 small children drive her insane.