"Lusty Lingo"

My friend Kim Nguyen was on TV this morning passing on the news that some big time employers have fired employees who were a little TOO candid in their BLOGS. I'm paraphrasing and so was she, so the cause of the effect will remain a bit of a mystery. For constitutional and other legal reasons, and a rational fear of image, I would hope those fired were close to comitting treasonous acts. I'd do this anyway even beyond a passion for the freedom of speech.  As it turns out it's just such a great mental and emotional enema. It's like slamming your fist into a concrete wall without the physical repurcussions. How cool is that?

To be honest with you I've tried to BLOG at a PG-13 level. That's not because of a fear of getting fired or permanently retired.  It's because I want teens to tune in. And I'd just as soon the CIA Tuned Out. (unless of course we are talking about the  Colorado, California or Chinese-Canadian Institutes of Art "CIA's". I'd welcome members of all three organizations.) I actually get a little amused at all the corporate and bureaucratic paranoia on one end, and the drive to shock on the other end.

At some level the old folk prhase, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words (names) will never hurt me" ought to apply. We've let 9/11 distractingly affect us in too many ways. I was a babe when  the Mc Carthy hearings were going on, but I later read about and met a few of the people really hurt by the nation's mass hysteria. Please let's don't go there over BLOGS.

And on the other end it always amazes me that some amongst us think we are the only ones who know "Those" words. It reminds me of a folktale about by maternal grandmother, a devout bible belt Christian who devoutly raised nine children, and lived well into her 90's.  We were led to believe she'd never been exposed to or expressed a profane word in all her years on Earth. Well, she gets in a serious car wreck at about the age of 93.  (from here on its myth) She is unconscious with a concussion, lying in a hospital bed when one of my mother's sisters visits Grandma in the hospital. She is reportedly "non compes mentes." My aunt reportedly asks the old what do I say to my dying mother question, " how are you feeling?"

Well, to hear it told, Grandma Murell lets loose with enough vile, obscene, sacreligious and seditious language to fill the Bible, the Torah, the Koran and a book of Confusious Sayings together. (she recovered and lived at least another five years.)

Where did she hear all those words? Who could have exposed her to such depravity? Was the woman possessed? Ah my friends who want to shock and dismay. The answer is she just happened to have lived on the planet for 90 plus years.

I'm always befuddled that there are those amongst us who believe either they are someone they knew invented the language. I've worked with men who fought in World War II who not only knew all those words, they knew how to translate them into five languages.  I worked with one WW II vet who used his battlefield education to compose smut lymrics he etched on the side of boxcars in German, French and Russian. Keep  your eyes peeled when the next freight train flies by.

Here's one on the other end of the spectrum for you.  I'm teaching a beginning high school drama class.  I've assigned all the students the same scene to memorize and later perform. The next day I'm called to the office to talk to a parent who is furious about this new fangled education that would expose his daughter to such foul language. Well, I asked and he answered, "it's where the husband says to his wife, 'Damn it Vinnie.' "

Well for you younger folk that's a line from "Life With Father," which would clearly get a 'G' rating just about anywhere it played today. At the same time in that class some advanced students were doing a William Shakespeare scene from "Taming of the Shrew." This father had no objection to that assignment.  For your own titillating amusement its the scene where Petruchio first meets up with Kathryn. Let me make this perfectly clear. Nobody is telling you you have to read it.

Don't get me wrong shockers. I really think there is room in our life behaviors for the prolific use of this language. If you are underneath a car turning a ratchet and your hand slips, and you bang your knuckles against a hot manifold, "Dang" is not going to get it done.

I worked with a psychologist in a reading clinic who'd used a goodly amount of our "basic" nouns, verbs and adjectives to help remedial students bridge some cultural learning gaps. Using her very own words, " look at the grafitti. Ever see anyone misspell or mispronounce the F word?"   I don't think so.

Grandma Murell outlived three husbands. One was a school teacher who knew Shakespeare, another one was a farmer who'd worked on a lot of hot manifolds. Or maybe she was possessed? We"ll never know for sure, dadgumit!