Words

There’s been a bit of talk about ‘s*x’ in this house lately. Not the act, but the actual word. ‘You’re a s*x* lady’, for example, has become something of a refrain bandied about in that way children do when they know that they don’t know what it means, but are seduced by the knowledge of potential subserviseness. You know what I mean. You’ve all been children.

When I hear them messing around with words with each other in the back yard, I do let it go a bit. I think it’s important that they have a chance to experiment with the words and so on. Plus, like, I do swear a bit, so, you know, I have to wear it a bit if they embarrass me when they’re out. But I also make quite an effort to point out that words have meanings, can hurt people, will offend people and so on. I find ‘well, would you say it at nana’s’ to be the best way of making my meaning felt. They seem to know instinctively, and I just love the looks on their faces when they say ‘well, of course not’. Like, how dumb do you think we are?

But apparently, while I have been in here tapping away at something I feel should not be taking quite so long to write, Andrew on PlaySchool said as he pointed to the sponge cakes he was about to transform into lamingtons ‘we’re going to s*x it up’. Both of my children reckon that’s what he said, and they’ve got those smiles as they tell me that’s what he said. The ones they have when they get to say something they’re not really supposed to be saying.

Really? Did Andrew really say that? Not that I’m going to write letters to the editor about it or start voting for John Howard in protest at left-wing bias on the ABC if he did. It’s not a moral outrage or anything, and it’s a pretty good description of what happens to sponge as it becomes lamington. But I’d kind of like to know. Just because…I dunno, just because it’s interesting if that is what he said. So if you were supervising your children’s viewing this afternoon, could you let me know? Thanks.