Bookends

When my son was young, I remember him asking me what swearing was. It took a while to form a response, but eventually I told him something like this:

"The actual words you might use aren't nearly as important as the consideration of who your audience is. If you're out in the woods with your buddies, I don't really care what four-letter words you choose as long as your friends are equally fine with them but if you use those same words in front of your mother or grandmother, then that may become a big problem"

I worked in a coal mine for five years where every imaginable expletive was acceptable and commonplace but I doubt that such vernacular would have crept into very many of my coworker's family dinner tables.

So over the last decade or so, whenever I've heard or have seen expressions, stickers, posts, signs or political flags with insinuatingly cruel or openly obscene language - for all to experience, I always whince because while it's fine to have a differing opinion, it just seems wrong to forgo kindness at the expense of untethered hubris.

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