Ugly Words

I have a pretty bad temper. Not violent. It manifests itself more verbally.

My language becomes, um, colorful. Not pastels, either.

I splatter paint with mean, ugly and hurtful.

In my angered heat of the moment, I don’t care who gets stuck with specks of those colors. Collateral damage.

My tone, loud.

I know, I’m a horrible person. Spare me.

Growing up, I was always taught to never put anything in writing because that is when something can come back to haunt you. Letters saved. Lessons learned.

So I use my words. Especially the words that smack, hit and sucker punch.

But I’ve begun texting them too. Especially if my anger is due to one of the kids and my husband isn’t home.

I text.

I’m not nice in my word choice. Remember, I splatter paint.

I never mean what I say after the situation has passed. I’m a heat of the moment type girl.

It’s who I am. We all have our schtick.

I was exceptionally perturbed due to a bad attitude that was directed toward me.

Let me explain. When I ask a kid to do something, generally it’s not an option. If I ask someone, a minor, to do something that should actually be considered a CHORE, it’s taken as more like I’m asking them a favor. But…it’s not a yes or no question. It’s a “of course, and what else can I do to earn my keep”.

Seriously.

But, when I’m told no. And then that person tells me to “shut up”. With attitude, of course.

I get pissed.

And it escalates.

It ALWAYS escalates.

And, if that kid wasn’t borne from my womb, I text fast, wicked viciously to the father.

Words go from my head, a whisper forms and stops on my lips and explode through my fingertips. I pound the touchscreen, an imprisoned victim of my rage.

And there it stays.

In my saved texts.

In his saved texts.

The written word that I was never supposed to use to show ugly emotion.

Because, unless it is destroyed in one way or another, it always comes back to haunt you.

The written words of anger.

Words that should never be imprinted on anything that could be used as evidence of ugly.

They were found.

Nosy kids. God, how we ask them NOT to touch our phones.

You’d think they listen.

But hell, they don’t even listen when we ask them to wash their hands after pooping or when we ask them to pick up the socks they dropped on the floor in front of the couch.

Why would we ever expect them to not snoop into our iPhones that lay upon the kitchen counter where they stay, charging.

Angry birds with an iPhone, snuck into the basement.

Led to reading texts.

Led to a hurt child.

Led to me apologizing, from the bottom of my heart, to a mother and her son.

Led to me realizing that my parents were SO very right.

Words, unless they are floral and pastel, with a hint of rainbows and fairies…

Should be destroyed immediately upon conception.

Because they truly do come back to haunt you.

And those ugly words that are flung like monkey poop…

no matter how many deep apologies are given and accepted…

The person those words were directed towards will, for a long time, wonder if they were really meant.

So the moral of my story that I really should have listened to and learned so many years ago…

Think ugly thoughts, don’t let thm escape from you in any form. Because they will, somehow, boomerang and leave you smelling from the shit you threw.

Comments

comments