By Cheryl Smith
I don’t know the man’s name and probably wouldn’t recognize him if I saw him again because I had temporarily misplaced my glasses.
It was Memorial Day and I had stopped by The Forum Bowl in Grand Prairie on a site visit after feeding veterans at Heroes House in East Dallas.
10 years ago I was at the opening of Heroes House with the Honorable Eddie Bernice Johnson. Over the years, we returned to Heroes House to feed the veterans and spend time with them; usually on Memorial Day, July 4, Labor Day, or Veterans Day.
There were also the times that we stopped by during the Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa season to spread some love.
Now back to Forum Bowl. Two men were standing talking and one of them said some choice words you might call “four letter words”or something of that sort.
The brother looked at me and apologized profusely. He covered his mouth and told me he was so sorry.
I thanked him and graciously accepted his apology.
I thought about the many times that I have been places and I heard people of all ages cussing and they never ac- knowledge that they are out of order.
I think in order to avoid getting offended I just take it as a sign of the times that this is what people are going to do and I need to get over it.
As a child, in my household, there was no cussing. My mother’s friends weren’t cussing, at least around us, but I did hear stories about folks “cussing like a sailor.”
Actually, I have stopped cursing so much, because it doesn’t feel as good as it has in the past when I felt I had to cuss just to make sure folks understood and digested what I was saying to the fullest extent.
Now today, I don’t care if you understand or not. You will just have to walk around clueless.
Now when I do cuss, I use a modified tone and I have taken to asking for forgiveness.
I can say it felt so good to hear that apology and show respect and common decency because too often that’s not the case.
It has become the norm to cuss any and everywhere and to any and everybody.
That’s where boundaries come in!
I do believe there is a time and place for everything, and I do take exception with age and sometimes gender. And then sometimes it’s about the relationship.
For example, while I never wanted my mother to hear me cuss, I really didn’t have a problem when I would hear the great Eddie Levert of the singing group, The OJays, in conversation with his sons Eddie and Shaun, and they would cuss.
It seemed to work in that scenario. Some people say they can’t help but cuss. It comes out. I say, “that’s bull!“
Frankly, just like you can control a fart, and we’ve all done that from time to time; you can control your language.
Even when I cuss fluently, I’ve watched my mouth around my elders.
You know how to act right!
I considered it to be a Black thing because we knew better, and then many of my Latin brothers and sisters told me they watch their mouths especially around elders.
We knew about respect.
Today, “you don’t respect me, I don’t respect you,” is the mantra of many.
I hope that we can get back to those really good old days of respecting our elders because watch what I tell you. The main ones who are out here disrespecting their elders are going to want respect when they become elders.
And that is the truth!
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