Urban Thought Collective

I don’t know how things went down at your home growing up, but in the Brown home, cursing was as routine as our spaghetti Sundays.

You come in after curfew, and it was… “Where the #%?@ have you been?”

Television too loud?: “#@&%, turn that $#!% down – can’t even hear myself think!”

Boyfriend called after midnight?: “You better tell that @!&^?% $!&?*# not to call our #*%! house this @$&* late. $#!@, I was having a good *$&?@% dream, too.”

That was the norm as far as I knew. So, operating in the “civilized” world initially proved difficult for me.

For the most part now, however, I have my potty mouth in check, using cuss words solely as terms of endearment (come give me a hug, you skinny-ass bitch) or when singing along to my beloved West Coast rap (have you ever heard the radio-edit version of NWA’s “Gansta Gangsta?” – pathetic!).

But this week – in Buena Beach – an incident occurred that took me back to my vulgar past. We’d had a staff meeting on Monday morning of the usual, unexciting variety. I was the last one in and, an hour later, the first one out. So the whole crew was right behind me when, three steps down the hallway, I stepped wrong in my 3-inch high platforms, causing my right heel to buckle and twist, which was excruciating at best. So, I did what any ordinary, sane member of the Brown family would do in the same situation, screaming “F%?#. F%?#, f%?#, f%?#, f%?#, f%?#! Mother f%?#er!” I might have even added a few “F%?#ing b!&?#”s had it not been for the looks of horror (rather than sympathy or concern for my injury) on the face of my boss.

I have to admit, I was a tad bit embarrassed as I continued down the hall to my desk. But ten minutes later, an e-mail from Danny made me feel so much more shameful, I was tempted to shut down my computer and take the first flight out of the country. Being the process-oriented guy he is, Danny’s e-mail asked staff to vote either in favor or against the establishment of a “No cursing at work” policy. Under the proposed plan, staff would get up to three warnings for a foul-mouth infraction with subsequent violations leading to penalties such as making lunch runs, cleaning up discarded gum from under conference room tables, and coming in on a Saturday to organize the supply room.

My body warmed over with both humiliation and anger as I reread the message a second and then a third time. Finally, I decided to reply to all (against Danny’s instructions) with my bold, capitalized, underlined NO vote. Just before hitting send, I recalled an article I’d read earlier this year discussing the benefits of swearing at work, which noted that it may boost morale and enhance solidarity among workers. So for good measure, I pasted the link to the article onto my message and sent it out.

That afternoon, I was pleased to learn that Danny’s proposition had been shot down, most folks I’m sure saying to themselves “This dude is f%?#$*@, crazy.” Perhaps I’m not so uncivilized after all.

Diane is (quite) a character on the online soap opera Buena Beach (www.buenabeach.com). Her weekly insights on what’s happening at the Beach are featured exclusively on Urban Thought Collective.