Boy, am I getting an education!
My great uncle(by marriage)Walter Buckminster, was born in Boston, and
had the accent to prove it. Walter was a carpenter by trade, and
built many a sturdy house in the Spokane area. The other workers
called Uncle Walter, Cream puff. Walter looked and sounded a great
deal like old Rube Goldberg...the fellow who "invented" all the weird
contraptions Whenever Uncle Walter hit a finger with the hammer,
instead of swearing, he would shout out, "Cream Puff!!!" I never
heard him say a real cuss word. "Oh Shaw", was another of his
favorites. I tried replacing Shit with Oh Shaw, but it just didn't
offer the same satisfaction.
Uncle Walter had a lifelong friend named Joe Wolf. When they were
together it was like Lum and Abner coming to life. Folks said Joe was
waiting around for Walter to die off so he could marry my Great Aunt
Inez. But Old Joe actually courted and married Walter and Inez'
daughter Ruth. Joe was nearly 25 years her elder, but they lived
happily ever after...for a short few years until his death. Their
other daughter was named Doris. Folks would ask Walter, "Where's
Doris?" And Walter would answer, "Don't say Daws, say Daws".
Walter was not the sharpest knife in the wrack, but he was a good
dishwasher and mothered Aunt Inez. They also had two sons, Ralph,
dumber than his dad, sold ice-cream bars during the summer and married
an Indian woman and moved onto the reservation where he died of
alcoholism, and Wendel, who became the station master for the Northern
Pacific Railroad in Pasco.
And thus ends another chapter in the exciting life of Carl Jarvis
On 12/1/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Actually, my favorite explative is, "Fucking Hell!". You see how little one
can learn about others from their online personnas?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Friday, December 01, 2017 3:19 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Which speak louder, words or actions?
Your comment made me grin. Your choice of words are exactly what I hear
whenever Cathy becomes super frustrated. I told her that it was the Seattle
Police Department that corrupted her, since she never used such language
when we were dating. Hmm...maybe that had something to do with it, too.
I agree with you regarding Amy Goodman. If you're quoting someone, then by
cracky, quote them.
But I do swear far more than my parents did. And my grandparents never,
never spoke a naughty word, unless they did it when only the two of them
were alone. But times have changed. When I was young we were scolded if we
said, "Jeez!" Might as well have said, "Crap".
Mother kept a bar of Ivory soap for cleaning the dirty words out of our
sweet little mouths. But anyway, thanks for giving me something to smile
about...thinking of you all alone, banging your fist on the table and
shouting, "Fuck it!" It doesn't seem to be the same person I've come to
know through our email. Just goes to show you.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/1/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I do think that this emphasis on deleting certain words from our
language is ill advised. What absolutely drives me crazy is when Amy
Goodman is quoting a racist cop, but substitutes the phrase, "the N
word", for the word, "nigger", which is what the cop actually said.
It's one thing to agree that using such a word in relation to another
person is unforgiveable, but it's quite another to remove the word
from the language entirely, when one is quoting another person. This
came to mind that day when I heard one of Paul Robeson's renditions of
Old Man River on Flashpoints in which the word, "nigger", appears.
Robeson sang the song as it was apparently, originally written. And
that did not diminish Paul Robeson in any way. Because I use the words
"fuck" and "fucking" to myself here in the privacy of my home every
time I am massively frustrated by something or other, I certainly
can't make judgments about anyone else's use of those words or others,
that are equally emotionally expressive.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Friday, December 01, 2017 12:52 PM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Which speak louder, words or actions?
Recently I received a friendly warning from a list moderator on
another list, requesting me to not use certain words. While I
disagree on principle, I agreed because he is, after all, the list
moderator.
But then I got to fussing around, and I wrote a friendly(I hope) note
back.
Okay, a ramble. But I decided to post it here and see what folks
thought about the subject. I did remove the moderator's name, but I
left my vulgar words in place. So, if your delicate nature is easily
offended please exercise your Delete finger.
Carl Jarvis
*****
And a Good Friday Morning to you, Moderator.
I agree to play by the rules, and will keep my f--king opinions to
myself.
But, as my mother was fond of saying, "Just between you and me and the
Gate Post", I find our American fear of certain words to be another
symptom of a bigger problem, that is our unwillingness to accept one
another, non judgmentally.
By my telling you that certain words are taboo, I am not communicating
with you, I am controlling you. When I write s--t, you know good and
well that I would have said "Shit" if we had been speaking face to
face. I wonder why we come to believe that f--k is not offensive, but
fuck, is?
I know, I know...I'm rambling, but the subject is interesting to me,
and I think better when I'm pecking along on my keyboard. Back when I
was young and very judgmental. and a womanizer born and bred, and a
snob, which means that I was a White Supremacist, and an elitist who
believed that we educated people were the rightful ones to run our
nation. I recall making fun of the bumbling speech of Black athletes.
Funny, these guys could do stuff my poor body could never do, and yet
I judged them by the words they spoke, and the manner in which they
fractured the language. It was years before I came to understand that
how they expressed themselves verbally, had nothing to do with their skill
level.
But it had everything to do with the social climate in which we were
raised.
Most of us develop our verbal skills from our parents. My buddy would
drop by and get into deep conversation with my dad. My buddy was
certain he could convert my dad to understanding the conservatives side of
politics.
But my buddy was no match for Dad, either in his subject, or the way
he presented it. He couldn't say more than a few words without
saying, "Shit!"(S--t!). My dad did not seem to notice, but later told
me that anyone who resorted to using vulgar words, was verbally
bankrupt. But I had been around my buddy's house when his dad was
home. He tossed out profanity like it was cotton candy. In my home I
can only recall Dad saying one vulgar phrase, he and a buddy were
singing, "You're in the Army now, not behind the plow. You'll never
get rich, you Son of a Bitch..." I stopped in my tracks and stared at
these two young men, singing at the top of their lungs. Did my dad really
sing, Son of a Bitch?
And one time in all my growing up did I ever hear my mother use
profanity.
We were in the kitchen of our new house, looking out the back window.
"That neighbor's house is the color of baby Shit!"
mother told me. My jaw dropped. But mother could say words like
Beer, so they sounded like swearing. She was a woman who never lost
control, and believed that drinking alcohol would cause her to lose
control, so until she was in her 60's she never drank anything. Then,
very suddenly, she began drinking Blackberry Cordial and White
Cadillac's.
So this ramble is a long way around the point that vulgar words were
never in my language skill, but by the same time I never found them
offensive when others used them. Oh sure, when some large drunk got
in my face and shouted, "I'm gonna smash your fucking face!", I did
find such talk to be offensive...even frightening.
But still...I understand that some folks are offended by words. As if
words ever hurt them! For me, it's the actions of others that offend
me. Donald Trump oozing at the Navajos with the portrait of Old
Hickory behind. That spoke volumes about the level of contempt Donald
Trump held for American Indians. The one president whose picture I
would have turned to face the wall during such a meeting.
And it was not Donald Trump's use of the word Pussy that made an
impression on me, I've certainly been around lockers, bars and work
gangs enough to have heard every gross word ever designed, but it was
the way in which Donald Trump said it. If the word Pussy offends some
on the list, then I hope they are also even more offended by the
degrading manner in which it was delivered. There's another four
lettered word to describe Donald Trump, Scum! And poor, dumb, silly
little Billy Bush. His entire career went down the tube when he gave
that nasty little giggle. I hope he revisits that moment over and over.
His big hero, Donald Trump kicked him to the curb.
Just locker room talk? No! Donald Trump's manner was Degrading to
every woman who ever lived.
Donald Trump is the incarnation of everything ugly that ever came out
of our Great White, Corporate Empire. And we're going to focus on
"P---y"? I'm not trying to convert anyone, Just going off because I
am filled with rage over where these Slick, Fancy Pants are taking the
American working class.
That would include you and me.
Although I still have tons to say, and although I still have two yummy
pieces of "C's" chocolates left, and although Cathy and her sister
have headed out to feed the horses and drive into Sequim to pick up
several bales of hay before the rain returns, I suspect that I should come
to an end.
Thanks for listening...if you're still reading this.
And hang in there, and keep an open mind. The world is changing so
fast that we have to work hard to stay up with it. I do feel some
sorry for those folk who are so set in cement that they are locked
away in some "Let's Pretend" world.
Carl Jarvis
***