Banish Banality; Long Live Lusty Language

Hearken to me, you world-weary cynics. Are you tired of scurrilious language and churlish public manners? Does ordinary foul-mouthing sound fusty to you? Do you long to give someone a piece of your mind without stooping to such unseemly behavior yourself? Take a lesson from Shakespeare and his Elizabethan compatriots, and join me in reviving the art of creative cursing.

In this endeavor I refer to a message on Shakespearean insults that crossed my screen some years ago. This message contained a table with three columns, two listing adjectives and one listing nouns. Choose a word from each column and string them together to create custom invectives for any occasion.

Think of how much more refined our public life would be if we engaged in florid fulminating instead of simply firing off f-bombs or giving the finger. The problem with our current vocabulary is that it’s banal and boring. Maybe this is the result of overuse; like angry bumper stickers, we’re exposed to so much profanity these days that the shock value is gone. Liberal doses of it sprinkled throughout movies and books sound lame, not edgy.

As I waited in line at a busy store recently, I overheard this exchange:

Guy #1: Man, I hate my boss. Total jerk (not the precise word used).

Guy #2: Sucks, man.

Guy #1: Yeah, well, screw him.

Now imagine the exchange sounding like this:

Guy #1: My boss is the veriest onion-eyed scoundrel.

Guy #2: What, such pernicious outrageous fortune!

Guy #1: A pox on him, the knavish rugheaded pantaloon.

Possible uses for creative curses extend beyond the personal into the public arena. Take political campaigns, for instance. The quality of insulting exchanges has sadly deteriorated since Spiro Agnew coined his famous “nattering nabobs of negativism” Royenish mottle-minded jackanape sounds more villainous than liar or cheat. If candidates widened their vocabularies and polished their imaginations, televised debates would be entertaining again.

Or consider the workplace. When a crafty coworker steals the promotion with your name on it, try muttering “That whoreson dogheaded cutpurse!” instead of an ordinary “Why, that S.O.B.” When your boss turns down your request for a raise, think “grizzled sour-faced minimus” instead of whining to yourself about the unfairness of it all. Not only will you feel righteous but you’ll add the sort of element of high drama to office politics that makes mundane jobs juicy.

And what would a breakup be without passionate recriminations? Surprise your soon-to-be-ex with a parting shot like “you wenching lily-livered miscreant!” or “If I’d only known you’re a total wanton empty-hearted scullion!” and I guarantee you won’t be soon forgotten.

Children could be taught Shakespearean as a second language, thus giving them a sophisticated tool for battling verbal bullies. “Leave me alone, you reeky motley-minded hedge-pig” would confound harassers used to “I h8 u” and other semiliterate sentiments in textese.

It may take awhile to become accustomed to linguistic flourishes. However, after a certain amount of practice, phrases like gleeking clay-brained clodpole and spongy milk-livered measle will probably come tripping off your tongue. The uses of Shakespearean insults are limited only by the imagination of the user. Try it the next time someone cuts you off on the freeway.

Fie, rapscallion!

(Here's a link to a handy Shakespearean "insult kit").

Hello Darkness, Our Old Friend

For a long time I thought that I was the only person living on this side of the Cascades who actually likes the long nights that winter brings. Summer is supposed to be everyone's favorite season, and yes, here in the PNW we greatly appreciate it when it finally comes. In fact, summer here is hard to beat; it rarely gets above 90 degrees, isn't muggy and comes with far fewer biting bugs than most parts of the country.

I find, however, that after a stretch of sun, brightness, heat and long daylight hours, the early darkness is soothing. That's why I welcome fall when it comes. Lately I'm meeting a growing number of people with similar feelings. It's as if we sigh with relief, fling off the sunglasses, put aside our noisy active selves and settle in for a long winter night's reading by the fireplace.

Summer's energy is intensely social. It's a time for hosting and visiting friends and relatives. Kids are home from school. There's always something going on in the streets and parks. It's all fun but eventually most people need a respite from constant stimulation.

In my neighborhood during summer, between revving engines, roaring lawn mowers and streetside shouting matches, it's sometimes impossible to find a quiet corner anywhere. But when cool fall weather rolls around, most people retreat inside. On a drizzly day I'm sometimes the only dog walker out & about. A winter evening stroll provides the best conditions for processing recent events, thinking about situations and making plans. If I leave the phone at home, there are no interruptions, emergencies or demands. There's enough breathing room to sort things out.

Even the most outgoing person needs a little "white space" in her life now and then. In traditional agricultural societies, winter was a time of rest. Humans are wired to rest and nest during the dark time of year.

Today we find ourselves making excuses whenever we crave space, as if putting limits on social and work obligations means we're slacking off. In addition, some people have to deal with overblown expectations for the holidays. It's hard to say "not this time" in the face of social pressure. And to top it off, electric lighting makes it possible to stay awake (theoretically, at least) far into the night in order to "get it all done."

But without darkness, silence and inward times for recharging, we might not have the juice to dive back into our activities when daylight comes again.

Come Over to the Dark Side - We Have Candy

When I was a kid, Halloween was, to me, the most intriguing holiday of the year. This wasn't because dressing up was so much fun; Mom chose our costumes, and they were usually something hastily cobbled together, like passing off our everyday raincoats as firemen's gear. Nor was it because of the promise of mountains of candy; we went trick-or-treating for UNICEF. No, Halloween fascinated me because of all the cool stuff we didn't get to do.

I'd watch with envy as neighbor girls spun up elaborate fairy or princess outfits out of nothing, went to parties and spent three hours on Halloween night trekking through the adjoining neighborhoods with a free-range freedom I could only dream about. I don't blame my parents for regarding the holiday as a nuisance they had to accommodate in order to keep a modicum of peace in the house - most adults didn't enjoy it much back then. In the 1960s, Halloween was purely a children's celebration.

My, how times change. Thirty-five years later, kids still love Halloween but so do a growing number of adults. And I confess I'm one of them.

I loved getting into my own getup and taking Noel & friends trick-or-treating when they were young. It's the only night of the year when both children and adults have social permission to roam outside at night without having to give an explanation. There's something magical about neighborhoods lit only by jack 0'lanterns, fairy lights and candle lanterns. More importantly, there's something vaguely subversive about wandering the streets at night when upright folk are supposed to be tucked safely behind curtained windows and doors. Having been raised a good Calvinist girl, the lure of the forbidden still exerts a strong pull.

Now, when all the kids I remember (including mine) are grown and flown, I still enjoy answering the door when the bell rings, exclaiming over costumes and giving out candy.

Several years ago I went to a women's gathering that happened to be held on Halloween night. We were invited to come in costume. I loved witnessing the imagination and effort many of the women put into it. However, what I noticed first was that the darkest, most decadent costumes were worn by the women who were the most accommodating, compliant or "nice" in mundane life. Coincidence? I don't think so.

Living in a society that denies aging and death, we have few outlets for expressing our anxieties and fears. Most of our most disturbing thoughts stay hidden beneath our calm facades. But beneath the surface they stew like a witch's cauldron.

Am I still smart/attractive/successful enough? Should I wash away the gray or ignore it? Where did these 20 pounds come from, and how can I get rid of them without making fitness a second career? When did I stop being pretty/handsome/hot, and what does life hold for me now that I'm not? What if I lose my job and my house and end up as a bag lady/transient? What if I or a loved one gets cancer? What will I do now that we don't have health insurance? What kind of future do my kids and grandkids have? What will death be like?

The thoughts come whether we respect them and give them space or suppress them. They're part of being human. But I've discovered that the real value of Halloween (or any other cultural holiday that honors aging and death, such as Mexico's Dia de la Muerta or the traditional church's All Souls Day) lies in the way it provides a culturally acceptable container for exploring these thoughts. It's the one night of the year when I and my friends in my women's circle don't have to pretend we're on top of the world, when we can acknowledge that age and experience have value, and that we're not certain of what the future holds but we'll join hands and deal with it together when it comes.

So I still look forward to Halloween night and the season surrounding it. I'll enjoy seeing the children who flock to our door and the adults who accompany them. Maybe I'll see you as well.

I'm the one with the tall pointed green hat.

Living Outside the Lines: Speaking Out Against Cruelty

The news is always full of shocking or sobering stories but the ones that always grab me first are the ones about young people driven to desperation by cruelty. This week's reports about Jamey Rodemeyer, the 14 year-old victim of bullying who took his own life. What especially has especially struck me as I read this and similar stories is how extreme bullying has become. This is probably partly because social media can enable harassment in ways that were not available when I was a kid.

However, it also seems to me that our culture is going through one of those times when cruelty is acceptable and mean-spiritedness is a virtue. How can we expect kids to respect each other when the adults around them, including political and media figures, regularly make hateful statements about those who are different from them?

As a kid I tended to be what educators now call a bystander; I was among the kids who knew that social cruelty was wrong but didn't say anything when I saw it happening to classmates. I now wish that the adults in my life had taught me - no, all of us kids - how to speak up.

In school kids often choose to be bystanders because they're afraid of the possible consequences of speaking up, including being ostracized or ridiculed. But I find that as an adult it can still a be challenge to speak out against racism or other injustices. The current tide goes against generosity and civility.

However, living outside the lines often entails going outside the comfort zone. During times when hate is tolerated, uncomfortable is the right thing to be.

Happy Realizations From the Dark Wood

Dante's famous poem Inferno starts out with something like "Suddenly in midlife, I woke to find myself wandering in a dark wood." Some midlife transitions are challenging, such as when the youngest child leaves home. In some ways, however, life gets easier once you're past 50. Here are some of the things I like about it:

• It's easier to let irritations, jabs, hostility and snark bounce off. I find it easier to dismiss things that I would have stewed about 20 years ago. Part of this is probably due to the experience of raising teenagers, or maybe it's because I've worked in customer or public service for so long that my "teflon coating" is thick. I think, though, that part of it is due to a mellowing process many of us undergo.
• I've stopped making unkeepable resolutions such as "I'll eat nothing but lettuce for a week and drink three gallons of water a day." Life (or what's left of it) is too short to obsess with extreme self-improvement.
• Along the same lines, I've decided that the point of relationships is to enjoy people, not try to improve them. Of course this is easier once the kids are grown and their fates are out of your hands; that's why this view of relationships would have been almost impossible for me to adopt 20 years ago.
• I've accepted the essential messiness of life. There will always be imperfections, snags, glitches and obstacles. The Japanese have a philosophy of aesthetics called wabi sabi, which means something like perfect imperfection - flaws are part of the beauty of an object. Once past 50 it's easier to lead a wabi sabi life.
• I don't try to work out the inexplicable contradictions of life, or at least not as intensely as I did in college philosophy. On any news service's home page there are reasons to believe that life on earth is both wonderful and lousy. Rather than straining to come up with explanations for the unfairness of random or cruel events, I'm more likely to ask myself what I can do to help.
  
• I've decided that it'll be better to wear myself out having adventures and working to solve problems than it would be to avoid stress (and growth) in order to prevent wrinkles & gray hair or live longer. I've met people who obsess about longevity and they don't seem happy.
• I've found that most things aren't matters of life & death even if they seem like it at the time. A friend being seriously injured in an accident is a matter of life & death; being unable to finish everything on the to-do list is not. Eliminating much of the internal drama makes life more enjoyable.
• Strangely, thinking about death doesn't bother me like it did when I was, say, 7 years old listening to Sunday school stories about Hell. In the end we all pass on but since a lot of people I knew are already there, it (whatever form it takes) can't be a bad place.

In all, even though I enjoyed my 20s, 30s and 40s, I wouldn't go back. In many ways the light in the woods is brighter now.

Face to Face: Dismantling Walls, One Friendship at a Time

I remember the day the East and West Germans began dismantling the Berlin wall. My husband and I watched it on the BBC news in our tiny apartment in Tokyo where we'd been teaching English. The best part of the whole operation was when people on either side of the wall crossed over and met those on the other side face to face.

This memory sprang to mind as a result of an encounter not long ago. I was attending a computer workshop. The instructor had given the class a 10-minute break and some participants were using it to surf. The person next to me was browsing a news website comment page, scowling the whole time. He turned to me, pointed at a comment and said, "This guy's right. Everyone hates us but they all want to move here."

I didn't have to ask him what he meant by everyone; I've heard the sentiment often enough. In my mid-20s when I worked as a refugee resettlement caseworker for Catholic Charities Refugee Services in Dallas, TX, people I met at conferences, parties and the gym said this all the time. At that age I felt compelled to correct them: no, many refugees don't want to leave their home countries but it's preferable to being shot by a firing squad or starving to death. I could have told my fellow student this, or point out that now that Vietnam is safe, many former refugees are moving back to help rebuild their country.

Over time, however, I've learned that debate usually doesn't change a thing when I encounter sweeping generalizations that reinforce prejudice and vilify strangers. What does seem to be effective is telling stories about my personal experiences with strangers-turned-friends. Countering "Everyone hates us" with "Oh, I don't know - when we lived in Japan, people were friendly and helpful" or "I've never seen that in the (fill in nationality) I've met" puts my reply in the realm of personal experience. And personal experience is more credible than unverified rumors.

This technique works not only with racially motivated statements but in any circumstance where a conversation partner makes generalizations I know aren't true. Last January one acquaintance made such a comment about police officers. After I pointed out to her that a mutual friend of ours is a retired cop and he's nothing like the stereotype she was describing, she realized what she'd been doing.

When sharing a face-to-face anecdote it's crucial to keep a neutral tone - you're telling a personal story, not debating or lecturing. We all indulge in prejudices. I found myself making assumptions about my fellow workshop participant: I bet he's never been out of Clark County, let alone visited a different country. He's probably never met anyone from Vietnam, Mexico or India. No wonder he assumed I'd agree with him - he probably believes all Americans think alike. And so on. I had to remind myself that I have plenty of friends on the other side of my own political fence - and they're wonderful people. I know they're wonderful because I've met them face to face, have had some challenging but mutually enlightening dialogues, and received numerous acts of kindness from them.

Maybe it's human nature to mentally divide the people we meet into Them and Us. But as Captain Jean-Luc Picard once said (I forgot which movie), being human means that we can always become better than we are. If we settle for the excuse "it's just human nature," we're not being all we can be. We're demeaning ourselves.

The world's problems are so overwhelming that a simple solution isn't possible. But I think that every time any of us consciously practices seeing the people we meet as individuals rather than components in a faceless group, and inviting those people into our lives if only for a single encounter, walls will be dismantled one brick at a time.

And Here's to Moms Who Can't Be There

Thirteen years ago (I calculate this by Noel's age - he was 6 then) I received a call from our next door neighbor Laurie, the single mother of a 6-month old baby. She worked as a food server at one of Vancouver's then-premier restaurants, one that offered a Mother's Day brunch and would certainly be booked up. Her request: would I be willing to babysit her daughter Anna that day, and take the baby to the restaurant during Laurie's lunch break so she could spend 30 minutes with her child?

Laurie's lunch break conflicted with plans our household had made for that day. Nonetheless, I had no problem telling Laurie that we - my entire household - would be delighted to help her. After all, she not only had to work on Mothers Day, she didn't have a partner with whom to collaborate arrangements.

I remember that particular day being a little more rushed than it would have been if Laurie hadn't called us, but whatever we did for her (and the details have gotten hazy in my mind), it didn't impinge on our plans to any significant degree. And we were able to help someone who otherwise would not have been able to spend any part of a culturally significant day with her daughter.

I wasn't being totally altruistic when I told our neighbor that we could help her. I was operating from the memory of what it had been like for me when Noel was 9 months old and I had to work 50 hours a week throughout the Christmas holiday season. I hated every minute that I was away from him, but as the only employed adult in the household during a recession, I didn't see much choice. The memory of that December is what drove me to offer Laurie our help, and it has driven me ever since.

In an ideal economy & society all parents, whether moms or dads, can get adequate maternity or paternity leave when the child is born or adopted, have a humane weekly work schedule that allows them to connect with their kids and still earn enough to support the family, and get time off to enjoy special days with their children. But we don't live in an ideal society. As a result, many parents are faced with the choice of either spending time connecting with family or keeping a job.

It shouldn't be this way. But it is. Many of the customer service staff waiting tables on Mothers' Day or Christmas or Easter are themselves parents. What separates them from the customers sitting at the tables isn't necessarily brains or education or career savvy. It's luck. I know it's au currant to believe that we create our own reality (New Age), pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps (American tradition) or can pray our way to success (Prosperity Protestantism) but for me, the fact is that random events like economic downturns and the actions of family members exert enormous influence. Blaming Laurie for her situation would have been like telling an 11-year old rape victim that she shouldn't have worn shorts on a 95-degree August day.

So on that Mothers' Day more than a decade ago, I decided to help our neighbor even though I can't say I was enthusiastic about it. My luck with jobs had been good that year, but I knew that it could just have easily been otherwise.

Today I enjoyed the best possible Mothers' Day that I could have now that Noel is grown & living on his own: I was able to sing with my friends in a beautiful setting, for an ever-changing audience of moms and their families. Now that I'm past the age that requires attendance at child-driven festivities, I can help other parents enjoy their special day.

I hope that if there were any moms like Laurie in the crowd, they received special blessings that will carry them through the times that they can't "be there." Sometimes the seemingly random actions of a stranger or the reluctant help of a busy neighbor are the very thing that ferries you over the rapids into safety.