THE MIGHTY C
[One from the archives today. New blog tomorrow!]
I’ll be honest. One of my favourite things about Britain may
surprise you (it's not the free medical, but that's definitely high on the list). No, it’s not the scathing wit or cutting edge music, or even the
quaint old buildings (some of them are just old, and could use with a little
upkeep). To be perfectly frank, as I know you can handle it, it’s the
widespread use, and general acceptance of the C word. Yes THAT C word. Fine,
the Queen doesn’t say it, but you know Charlie boy lets it roll off the old
tongue once in awhile.
It took me about a month to really register that was indeed
the word I was hearing. But alas! Do my subversive little Yankee ears deceive
me? You people are saying the forbidden word of all words. Where I come from,
this little nasty gem is up there with the nastiest of words. In the mighty
land of free speech, [stop laughing], this word could actually get you
incarcerated. It must be said that I grew up with a Father whose profound
embrace of the F word meant that I learned to use it as a noun, adjective and
verb by the age of seven, so you can understand my excitement. [My mother,
thank god, was the picture of refinement and elegance so I turned out fairly
balanced].
So there I was, virtually skipping through the streets of
London shouting it from the rooftops like Dick Van Dyke’s alternate gendered evil
twin: “C----!” I’d combine it, “F----- C----!” Use it in a sentence, “Could you
believe that f------ c---!” [My English granny was definitely rolling over in
her grave]. Just feeling it roll off my tongue would send me into liberated
hysterics. I started hearing it films, not Merchant Ivory of course, but you’ve
seen one you’ve seen em all, on talk shows, at dinner parties ‘Hey, c---, could
you pass the Camembert’. (Fine, I may be exaggerating now). In fact, recently, four different forms of the word c*nt have just been added to the English dictionary (c*nty, c*ntish, c*nted, and c*nting). That is how revered this mighty word now is (revered and yet still very much feared in some parts).
It’s hard to forget the time I returned to the States and
used it in front of my mother, my English mother, for that matter. (Yes she’s
been Americanized, but the woman still drinks tea like it’s water). She about
barred me from returning to London, ‘that was not how we spoke when I lived
there!’. I of course, bathed in my new uber cool anglophilia, told her to chill
out, assuring her that everyone says it now. “I promise Mom, It’s like her
majesty’s version of ‘have a nice day”.
My English friends finally had to burst my euphoric bubble and tell me
that not everyone said it, and yes, it was still deemed offensive...I suppose
some of the reactions I received started to make a bit more sense.
Fine. I’ll save it like a precious piece of Parisian
chocolate only to make an appearance for the very deserving. You’re out there,
and know who you are!
C u next Tuesday.