Picket Fence Post

That’s the phrase that was shrieked at me the other day by the Youngest Boy who believed that I had wantonly deprived him of his right to do whatever his first-grade heart desired.

The Spouse said that the pediatric utterance is proof-positive that I’ve officially become Ralphie’s father. Certainly you know Ralphie . . . the kid from the classic film A Christmas Story  whose father transformed the muttering of obscenities into a work of art. In one of the movie’s pivotal moments, Ralphie reflexively says the “f” word — what A Christmas Story called “the queen mother of dirty words.” And Ralphie says it in front of his dad. Irony of all ironies, it never occurs to Ralphie’s parents that their son could’ve possibly learned the “f” word from his foul-mouthed father, and press him to identify the culprit who extinguished Ralphie’s innocence by invoking the dreaded expletive in front of the boy. (Ralphie scape-goats his friend.)

Not that I’m running around my house randomly hurling the “f” word, mind you. While I’ll cop to saying the “s” word when, for example, a pile of glass dessert plates accidentally comes raining down on my head from an upper cabinet shelf as I’m fetching cereal bowls for kids’ breakfasts, I’ve tried my best to refrain from invoking the mother of all bad words in front of the little people. (No promises about what words I might hurl at The Spouse in the heat of anger behind closed doors though, in the middle of a “grown-up” fight.)

Since becoming a mom, I’ve worked hard at replacing colorful words in my vocabulary with tamer ones. I’ve been rather successful at invoking the word “freakin’” instead of its sinister cousin. Apparently too successful, as it’s now being used by my Youngest Boy. Against me.

I suppose being a freakin’ mommy’s not so bad. It could be worse.