I Taught My Granddaughter To Curse

I am not proud that I taught my granddaughter to curse.

I got busted. She overheard me say, “Oh Shit!” When the mailman arrived, she couldn’t wait to tell him the exciting new. “I learned a new fun word from my Gigi. “Shit!” she announced proudly. He scowled at me. “I did not teach you that!” I protested. “Yes you did, Gigi. You yelled, ‘Oh Shit!’ when you spilled your coffee.” I looked at the mailman and mouthed, “Oh Shit!” He grinned at me sympathetically. He must be a potty mouth grandfather.

That became her word of the day. “Oh shit! Let the dog out. Oh shit!! Let the dog in. Oh shit! It’s lunchtime.” Then it became her word of the week and she used it everywhere. At the grocery store she announced, “Oh shit! We forgot my cereal.” It’s odd how fast they learn to use the words with appropriate timing. And where did she learn the appropriate facial expression?

I want my sweet grand kids to use clean and approved language. And so I have decided to clean up my potty mouth. This is a challenge for me. I have a clean mind and heart, but every so often an F- bomb escapes from my lips. It seriously wiggles past my teeth and before I can bite it back, it’s out. I hate when it happens.

My problem is that I have a latent PMS (Potty Mouth Syndrome). After raising five kids, some words just slip out all on their own. I cannot be held responsible because I survived their teen years by a thread. In hindsight, that’s when I was at my peak of PMS. At two in the morning, I stared out the window praying they’d come home safe so I could kill them personally. I definitely developed my advanced, choice, vocabulary words those nights.

My goal was to completely remove the F bomb from my language. This was not as easy as I thought it would be. The darn (notice I said darn) F words kept forming on my lips. Once the Fffff sound started I had to get creative quickly.“What the Fook?” was my personal favorite. It’s such a perfect question showing annoyance, yet fondness. I’m all about soft cursing.

If the cashier loaded my grocer bag too full, I’d ask, “What the Fook?” while smiling. I never want to hear the little ones ask that question, even if they are smiling. It’s too close to the real F word. I had to drop that one.

I tried using Fig Newton as my new word, but every time I asked, “What the Fig Newton?” the cashier ran and grabbed a bag of cookies for me. After eight bags of cookies, I needed another word.

I tried Frill. That sounds clean and it’s quite charming. The only problem is my pronunciation. It sounds like Fah-Reeeel. My mouth gets distorted and neck muscles tighten like a turkey straining. It’s a horrible look. My sister suggested I just use the F word instead of making that face.

I thought of Cockeypop …or is it Poppycock? That is a loaded word and a train wreck waiting to happen. My menopausal mind could do so much damage with either. I dismissed them both immediately, as I giggled.

As you can see, I am struggling. My fear is that by the time I get my language kid-approved, they’ll have new ones to teach me. I suck at this stuff.

Ooops!