Cursing As A Second Language, or Pardon My French

When my beloved attempted one of her rare, feeble attempts at cursing the other night, I was reminded that Americans, although thought to be monolingual, usually do speak a second language. That is, we speak polite English and, when required, profane English. Unfortunately for my poor wife her profanity sounds out of whack, like a foreigner mangling English. Her mother likes to say that my late father-in-law never cursed in front of the family. This was perhaps his only redeeming quality and also probably explains LInda’s complete ineptness when trying to drop an F bomb in one of its various configurations. No role modeling. I can report that my own father was loathe to let a dirty word cross his very Christian lips. He was so fastidious that even the word “snot” caused him to frown. Yet, I became fluent in profanity and I suppose it was my spouse’s recent  and hilariously original “she is a fuck wad brain doner”, directed, I believe, at an impolite shopkeeper, that caused me to reflect on how my fluency developed and how the ability to shift back and forth between languages can provide we monolinguists an understanding of what it is actually like to be, well...European. I’m certain that I was inspired to learn to curse after first hearing my maternal grandfather call a recalcitrant milk cow, “You sonofabitch!” Sonofabitch had a wonderful ring to it and when I tried it out later (I believe I was five) it felt good to let the ess slide easily out of my mouth followed by a rhythmic vowel-consonant-vowel connector and then forming the lips together to emit the emphatic exhalation of “bitch.” (“Sonofabitch” seems to be almost archaic these days replaced in the idiom by the more currently popular “Jackass” which I must admit is a wonderful word and one of my favorites because there are so many jackasses around). A few years later in the copper town of Miami, Arizona, older kids offered obscenities in English and Spanish. I would go out into our garage and demonstrate early evidence of  a determined scholarship by practicing my swearing, stringing my handful of blue words together in various combinations to test their sound and feeling. In high school, when the boys congregated, we would would curse. Novels like From Here to Eternity, The Naked and the Dead and Lady Chaterley’s Lover provided vocabulary and syntax. Those college years took swearing to a new level, supplemented by tutoring from Forest Service codgers in the summer months. And, of course, military service put one shoulder to shoulder with some of the most wonderfully profane speakers one could ever hope to meet. Some were NCOs. But often the most fluent in profanity were Colonels, full birds, wing commanders, little kings of fiefdoms all their own who could speak in any setting, save for a meeting of the Officer’s Wives Club, with complete impunity. But let’s face it. The kids today have it easy. They don’t have to work to learn to swear. It’s woven into the music, the movies and television. It’s  on the internet. As a result, they’re not very good at it. Profanity today is unimaginative and repetitive. Like with any other skill the majority are mediocre performers. Most people, when swearing just sound nasty or obnoxious or stupid. As a result of this developing cultural ineptitude my recommendation to most clumsy cursers is to clean it up and quit talking profanely until you’ve had a an opportunity to study at the feet of a master. How can I find one, you ask? The answer, Grasshopper, is that you’ll know one when you hear one. Fuckin' A.

Comments

[Phil]

When your beloved finally lets go it’s a gooder. I would have like to have been a fly on the wall when " wad brain doner" came out of her lips.

[schuyler]

I won't. I just don't believe it. Not my sweet auntie linda. In fact, Im going to need an mp3 clip in order to believe it. Also Im going to have to have my lawyer issue a cease and desist as "schuyler smith and the fuckwadbraindoners" is already the name of my punk band.

[Phil]

How is it that you got the f-word to stick? When I hit post it edited mine. See, I can't even swear on-line, let alone in real life.