Bad Words

CONTENTS

That Time Yesterday Where My Three-Year-Old Said A Lot Of Bad Words Because I'm His Dad.

AND:

That Other Time Last Weekend I Thought My Three-Year-Old Said The N-Word, Like I Wasn't His Dad. And Instead He Was Raised By An 1850s Plantation Owner.

Most three-year-olds are fairly oblivious about adult conversation. If you're not talking to them, they aren't interested at all. And when you are talking to them, they are still probably not that interested.

My son J is exactly like that.

But his twin brother R is not like that.

He hears, and remembers, everything.

This is why when he clumsily fell into his scooter and knocked over two other scooters, he casually remarked, "shit".

When I asked him where he heard that, he said "you say it".

I said, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't say that and you shouldn't say it either. It's not very nice."

He then asked, "what about bugger?"

I don't think I say that one, but I couldn't be certain. Rather than ask where he heard it and possibly be incriminated further, I just said, "don't say that either please."

"What about crap?"

That one is mine. Oops.

"What about Jesus?"

Hmmm.

Eventually we agreed that instead of "shit", he should say "oh no", and that I'll try to do the same.


And yet, all this wasn't as terrifying as the time about one week earlier where I thought he said the n-word.

For no reason, he appeared to say "you're n-----."

I asked him to repeat himself, and not because of the grammatical weakness inherent in his sentence structure. Then I asked my wife to clarify what she thought he had said. It was what I thought he had said.

So, with a lot of trepidation, I queried where he'd heard that word. I honestly can't recall hearing that word outside of TV and music, and we are pretty careful in regulating what he watches and hears (except for when it's coming from me).

He mentioned a few people we know. I was extremely confident they wouldn't say that.

It then sounded like he said, "what are my n-----s?".

"What?"

"What are my nickles?"

I then caught what he was looking at, and was instantly relieved.

"Your knuckles?"

"Yes."

He had received a few fist bumps over the usual high fives lately.