You Kiss Your Mother With That Mouth?

After my Mom and Step-dad divorced and our family home was sold, my Mom found a townhouse for us. We spent one hot, summer Saturday moving all of our belongings across town into our new place. It was a scary time, a new neighborhood and I was about to start middle school. But I was so exhausted that I fell into bed that night and I did not move once in my sleep.

At 8am on Sunday morning, I woke up to something I have never heard before. A woman screaming obscenities, with a thick Boston accent, at the top of her lungs at her entire family. "What the fuck do you think this is, a fucking hotel? Get your lazy asses out of bed and walk the fucking dogs! Then clean your God damned rooms." I looked out my bedroom window and I saw a platinum blond woman in rollers and a bright yellow housecoat yelling at two kids. The girl, who looked about my age, got both of the dogs and took them out for a walk. The boy who looked like he was in high school, just sat at the table and smirked while the woman yelled at him. Then a man came into their kitchen and said something to the woman. She didn't like what he said because she started whacking him on the head with her fists and yelling more foul language.

This family was making so much racket, that my mother woke up and came into my room. We both were stunned by the show going on across our driveway. We peered through my curtains, watching and listening as this woman screamed at her family. It was quite a show. I can honestly say that I learned how to properly use every single swear word (except the often maligned c-word) that morning. I owe my filthy vocabulary to that woman. Over the years, that woman who I lovingly called Mizz Betty became a second mother to me and her daughter became one of my best friends.

Mizz Betty passed away November 11, 2002. I fucking miss her.

My Third Step On The Slippery Slope

Step One

Step Two

From birth until age 10, I wasn't exposed to a lot of cursing in my home. My mom didn't curse, my stepfather didn't curse and aside from that one time at Christmas, I didn't curse. Then my parents split up. My mom had caught my stepfather cheating on her. Something in her changed from the mother I was familiar with, she became a disco dancing, smoking, wild woman.

One night, we came home to find that my stepfather had broken into the house and taken half of everything. Half of the food. Half of the linens. Half of the furniture. Half of the tools. Half of the Christmas decorations. If it could be divided into two, he took half of it, save for my belongings. My mom was livid. She got on the phone and started yelling at him. After about 10 minutes of screaming she yelled, "YOU PRICK!" and hung up.

I didn't think anything of it. So a few days later when some stinky boy stole our ball during a two-square game, I hollered, "You prick!" as I ran after him. My teacher was on yard duty that day and he called me over immediately.

Mr. K: "Michele, What did you call him?"

Me: "A prick?"

Mr. K: "Do you know what that means?"

Me: "It's like a poke with a needle and you can call someone that when they steal stuff."

Mr. K: "Where did you hear that?"

Me: "My mom called my Dad that the other night when he stole her bed."

Mr.K: "Well, that is a grown up word. I don't want you using that anymore, ok?. I am going to call your mom today."

Me: " Ok."

Six months later, my life changed dramatically. And so did my vocabulary.

When Misha Became A Potty-Mouth

It was Christmas Eve, 1974 and I was one month away from my 6th birthday. My Mom, Step-Dad and I were making sugar cookies to leave out for Santa. We were getting near the end of the batch and the dough was starting to stick to the cookie cutters. I was getting very annoyed. I was shaking and shaking the cookie cutter, but the cookie wouldn't fall out.
That is when I said "Fucking cookie!"
My dad said "What?"
I said, "Fucking cookie won't come out of the cookie cutter"
My mom said "WHAT DID YOU SAY?"
At this point, my dad is turning bright red; shaking and starting to sweat, he was doing everything in his power not to laugh.
I said "Fucking cookie."
She interrupted me and said "Michele Marie! Where did you hear that?"
I replied "Anatoly."
She mutters "Oh that little commie bastard!"
Now, here is the back-story:
I was going to Kindergarten at a very "hoity toity" private school. My mom and Step Dad were paying big bucks for me to get my basic kindergarten education along with the "hoity toity" additions of: Art class, Ballet class, Swimming class, Acting class, Foreign Languages, Etiquette classes, Cooking classes...the whole "hoity toity" package.
I wore a plaid skirt, blue blazer and saddle shoes to class every day. My family wasn't rich, my mom worked extra to pay for my tuition. But the children I went to school with...Well, their folks were rolling in the bucks. Anatoly, the aforementioned "little commie bastard", was the son of the Soviet Consulate General, or something important like that. My mom and Step Dad, being ULTRA conservative, were not pleased that he was my classmate. This was just the ammunition my mom needed to try and get this kid out of the school.
She stewed all Christmas, she started to boil around New Year's, by the time school started again...She was white hot. We arrived at school early; my mom met the Headmaster at the door. She started off well, talking calmly, telling him how our Christmas was scarred by the education I received by Anatoly. Apparently, she did not get the response she liked from the Headmaster. Because what I heard from behind that closed door was my mom, screaming;
"I BUST MY ASS TO PAY FOR THIS PRESTIGIOUS SCHOOL. I WANT MY DAUGHTER TO COME OUT OF THIS PLACE EDUCATED. I DIDN'T SEND HER HERE TO LEARN GUTTER LANGUAGE FROM SOME LITTLE COMMIE BASTARD. YOU BETTER FIND A WAY TO FIX THIS. I WANT THAT LITTLE COMMIE BASTARD...GONE!"
The meeting didn't go the way my mom planned. I finished the year at the school and the next year I was put in Parochial School. It was there, in first grade, where I learned what a "BONER" was.
My mom just couldn't win.

Mother Daughter Profanity.

Thursday my mom came up to visit me. She helped me with some straightening up so when the girl comes to clean my house, she can actually clean. I kept reminding her that she did not need to give the house "The German Scrub-down", merely help me get stuff out of the way for the cleaning lady. She wouldn't listen. This is the conversation we had in my kitchen:

Me: Old woman, if you don't stop sweeping the floor I am going to kick your ass.

Her: Oh yeah? You with your gimpy neck and arm? How are you going to kick my ass?

Me: You are old, you have a pain in your ass from your sciatica, only one eye, a torn rotator cuff and two swollen feet. I have still have one good arm, two eyes and two good feet. It won't be a fair fight and I'll kick your ass. So quit sweeping the fucking floor!

Her: Shut the fuck up you ungrateful child!

Me: Now Joan, be nice to me. I am the only child. Not only will I pick the nursing home you'll get put into, I will also be writing your obituary. You've seen what can happen with that!

Then we both starting laughing so hard, I started to cry and she peed her pants. In my kitchen. We had to mop the floor anyway.

Lessons Learned From An Obit.

My mom, like many seniors, reads the obituaries in her local paper each morning while sipping her cup of coffee. She often calls me and reads them to me on the phone. I normally tune her out and play on the computer while she reads them. This latest one was different. Here is how our conversation went:

Me (hearing my mom read yet another obit to me): "blah, blah, blah, yadda yadda, Dolores...never had a kind word or deed..."

Me: "Mom, shut the fuck up! What was that?"

She read it again.

Me: "No way. This is a joke. Give me that chick's name and I will google it while you read the rest to me!"

The lessons I have gleaned from this:

1.) Be careful how you treat people, one of them might be writing your obituary.

2.) The death of someone hurtful doesn't erase the hurt.

3.) Therapy and forgiveness are good things.

Things my mom and I discussed about this obituary:

1.) It is one sided. A cheap shot towards someone who cannot defend herself.

2.) Her family needs therapy or something to get over these feelings of anger and hurt.

3.) We would never air our family's dirty laundry in the newspaper.

For more info on how this got into the paper, click here.