Knowledge Acquired On a Don’t-Need-to-Know Basis

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Knowledge Acquired On a Don’t-Need-to-Know Basis

 

“Well, that’s just vulgar.”

“Don’t be vulgar.”

“They are vulgar people.”

I lie late at night on the top bunk in my childhood room many moons ago and listen to The Voices. Staring at the hovering ceiling and awaiting sweet sleep, I try to sort out what The Voices are telling me.

The word “vulgar” keeps popping up and forcing me to work past it. It is a word my mother uses frequently in describing uncouth behavior or disreputable people or scatological language.

It is an interesting word because it is alive with uncomfortable meaning, abrasive undertone.

Vulgar.

Don’t ever hear that word in my present grownup world. Wonder why?

“Vulgar” is Mother’s way of avoiding the use of what she calls “curse words,” the words she feels are useless and way too easy to employ. When I run out of creative vocabulary, I tend to resort to short-cut words, usually terse and profane. I learn from her that in a stressful or confrontational situation it is important to stop, count to ten, then carefully and thoughtfully speak. The few times I have been able to employ this advice, it actually works.

Unfortunately, to this day, my mouth generally moves more spontaneously than my brain…so Mom’s advice remains affixed to a wall in a red metal box with small window and sign that reads, “In case of vulgar usage, break glass and count to ten.”

Or something like that.

I don’t like being vulgar, and I don’t like it when vulgarity abounds in my childhood world as well as today’s world.  So, vulgar is my constant filter. Vulgar serves as a protective helmet that I wear in order to fend off the vulgarians.

And it helps me get smugly through the day, knowing that vulgar people are so ignorant they can’t even count to ten

 

© Jim Reed 2016 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com/podcast

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