November 4, 2011

A wee little word challenge

I want all the words. Listed here.

All the words from childhood that made you giggle, that you couldn't use for one reason or another. I want them here.

You see, I just remembered another one. Dink.

I would never have said this word when I was a kid. My friend called her dad that, mostly behind his back. I couldn't. I could barely stand hearing it but I would never, ever actually say it. I still won't.

But I can say the c word, no problem. (That may come as a shock to many of you, I hope you won't leave as a result of this news. My use of the word is political, and something I would happily explain on another day.) Funny thing is? I can't type it. Not here, not there, not anywhere. I mean I can, but I wouldn't. It is simply too harsh, too divisive. It causes too many to cringe, even the connotation of it.

And here, though I promised I wouldn't, here I will tell you why I use it, selectively, in company that would understand. Because suddenly, as I type this, I know why I can only type dink, but not actually slide it across my vocal folds.

Mostly? The words we use for the female anatomy are hateful and hated. The c word is one of these. As is douche (which some of you know makes me cringe and throw up a little in my mouth) and ... oh, bugger.

No. Not bugger. Fortunately women can never be that (without tools).

But I just realised that I'm totally procrastinating another project that I was to deliver at midnight. I'll develop this idea a bit more in the days to come. Maybe leaving something for another day will make me write here more than sporadically.

That's the thing about deadlines. It's amazing how much other stuff one finishes when one has something one is supposed to be producing.

But back to the original thought. It's a funny thing about writing, isn't it? It allows us to "say" things we can't put into the vibrations that are sound. Maybe that's why so many people, and not just those who long considered themselves to be "writers", are blogging, FBing, writing shit down.

In the meanwhile? Whilst I push out the work I have to produce now? Moar words please. I want them all.

5 comments:

  1. Butt, buttface, stinkface, pretty much anything ending with the word face. Boob, Uranus, doody. Anything with the word poop in it.

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  2. Bwa ha ha ha ha! Wait till your kid turns four and lets you know how hilarious that stuffz is at every flipping meal!!! The worst thing about potty mouth is that we have to pretend it is not funny when it is. And if you haven't already discovered it, trust me, it is inevitable.

    (My husband already blames me because I cannot resist. And he's the one who totally corrupted me. I never even tooted audibly till I met him.)

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  3. I hate the word cock. Doesn't matter if it is referring to roosters or male anatomy. I hate it. I hate it worse than the c word. I do, however, like dink and use it frequently.

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  4. Oh Cindy. You are exactly who I was trying to fish out writing this, I just didn't know it was you. Funny that I can picture you, in your gorgeous heels, saying, What a dink!

    Um, you probably don't know this but my maiden name is Cox. Bwa ha ha ha ha! As such I don't love that word either.

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  5. Whenever I think of the word douche, I think of this story that my German professor in college told us about an embarrassing linguistic moment when she was in college in the States.

    The German word for shower is Dusche, which is pronounced the same as douche, and you know how sometimes bilingual folks will throw in a word from their native language into a English sentence? Well, she was going to go take a shower and she announced "I'm going to go off for a Dusche, now!" and everyone in earshot busted out laughing and someone had to explain to her what she just said in English.

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