Language Skills

When my first child was born, a nurse brought her to me and I was suddenly plunged into a whole new world of mommyhood. I was overwhelmed with feelings of love and joy. I was going to love her forever. I was going to protect her from everything bad and try to give her everything good that I possibly could. I was going to be very mature now. I was going to be self-sacrificing and non-judgmental. I was going to be wise and fair.

However, there was a thought racing back and forth inside my brain that I bet most other mothers didn’t get. How was I going to not say ‘shit?’ Mommies weren’t supposed to say that word. In fact, there was a whole lot of words that mommies weren’t supposed to say which I felt would be totally out of my realm of ability to avoid. It’s not that I am a person who must swear an inordinate amount. But when I stub my toe there is no other word as satisfying to say as the word, “shit.” Somehow, “darn it!” just doesn’t work.

“Well, I have time,” I thought. “She’s just a baby.”

I spent the next few years being careful what I said when I was around baby. There is nothing more embarrassing than a two-year old walking around saying, “Shit shit shit shit shit.” When I hear that, even I, as liberal tongued as I am, still find myself thinking, “Well his parents must have real foul mouths.”

Then one day while I was visiting my sister in New York I was given a revelation. I was in the living room of her very chic Manhattan apartment when I heard a door slam on the other side of the hallway and a woman yell, “OUCH!” Then I heard a little girl’s voice say, “Good mommy, you didn’t say shit.”

I was impressed. This mommy was cool and hip. She had not only taught her child how to use the word “shit” appropriately, she had taught her child how to not use the word shit. There was a lesson here for me.

I wanted to be cool and hip like her. It was time to stop saying “darn it.” I decided right then I was going to let the real me back out of the closet and teach my child to swear appropriately.

There have been one or two embarrassing moments since then. When children are under five, they don’t always make good decisions about their language. But I reminded myself not to worry. After all, hasn’t it been proven by experts that if you don’t make a big deal about something, chances are your kids won’t either?

Now my children are older and they have learned to swear on occasion just like me but their vocabulary is full and rich. They never swear inappropriately (well, make that almost never.) Sometimes when they fall or hurt themselves they say, “Oh shit!” It makes sense. The apple never falls far from the tree (unless it is a very round apple and the tree is growing on a hill.)

One day we were in the car driving home from school with a rare afternoon of emptiness in front of us. No soccer practice, no Hebrew school, no piano lesson, no homework! Emma the play-date was with us. Everyone wanted to rent a movie.

“Okay,” I surprised them.

They immediately offered up the name of a movie they wanted to see…were DYING to see. I had never heard of it so I asked them what it was rated.

“PG13” they answered together.

“Well, what is it rated PG13 for?” I asked.

“Language,” said Sarah. “But it doesn’t have the F word and we already know how to say shit and sucks and damn and hell.”

That's when I knew I was as hip and cool as the mommy in New York City.