Bad Words

Monday, Issa's bus was a bit late. As it turns out, Mr. Sam, who runs a very tight bus, decided that everyone needed assigned seats. The better behaved you are, the farther back you get to sit. Apparently most of the "big boys" are near the front, and Issa and her friends are in the back. She was quite happy.

Yesterday, though, she got off the bus looking very worried...

"Mom, I have a problem."

"Okay, what's wrong?"

"Well, I sit in front of two fifth grade girls now, and they used a lot of bad words today."

I was ready for this conversation. I knew it would happen eventually, but I still wanted to tread lightly.

"Oh. What words? I want to be sure we can talk about them and that you know what you mean."

"Oh, I know what they mean! The first girl said, 'You f-word.' Then the second girl said, 'S-word. Did not.' Then the first girl said, 'D-word. You would say that.'"

I was at a bit of a loss. "Baby, can you tell me the words? You won't be in trouble because we need to talk about them."

Deep sigh. "They said fart, shut-up, and duh."

I had to work very hard to stifle my laughter. We did talk about how those words are not polite or the best choices, but the bigger words are still somewhere in our future, my friends.