why you gotta cuss so much?

As a blogger, I’m faced with choosing my words to adequately describe how I’m feeling.  I choose situations or topics that are funny or have caused me angst or are of interest to me.  Often, the first thoughts I have about something are not what end up being typed or published on my blog.   Often, my first thoughts require editing, as the words I think are not the words I want you to hear or read.

I’m mostly talking about cursing and other crude language.  You may or may not have noticed, there is very little cursing on my blog.  Sure, I drop a damn or hell every once in a while.  Occasionally a crap (not a curse word really) might get thrown out there.  But you won’t see the “S word” or the “F bomb” here. 

Am I holier than thou?  Probably not.  Well, definitely not.   I’m the first one to admit I curse when angry or surprised or completely excited, good or bad.  I attempt to not do this when my children are around.  I don’t always succeed.  Jenna, in particular, is adept at catching me and yelling “Language!”  I wish I could tell you my mouth is pure, but somehow it’s not.

But I do have control of what I put on paper, or on my blog.  I can write out my thoughts and take my time determining what words to use and how to use them.  And I choose to not use harsher language, when there’s other language available to use.  Sometimes a particular subject would seem to require cursing to convey a level of feeling about something.  I get that.

It’s the gratuitous foul language that gets to me.  When there’s too much, I don’t even want to read on.  For me, it gets in the way of the story.  I know there are many of you who don’t agree with me.  You think you’re being honest or real.  That’s cool.  It’s just not me.  I’m not here to call you out for cursing on your blog.  I’m just telling you why I choose not too.

When I was creating this blog, I thought a lot about how “real” or “honest” I wanted to be.  I thought about how “raw” I wanted to be.  I thought about what I wanted out there written, for all the world to see.  I thought about what my daughters would see.  I thought about what my family would see.  (I was raised to not, under any circumstances, use foul language.) I realized, whatever I put out there, anyone could read. While I get what some bloggers are trying to say with their use of adult language, it’s not a path I want to go down.  My words are out there forever and I can’t take them back.  When I go back and read my blog 10 or 20 years from now, I don’t want to cringe at the way I wrote.  I want my kids to not be embarrassed to share that I blog.  I don’t want to regret my writing or the things I say. 

No, I’m not a risk taker when it comes to that.  It causes me more anxiety to write something that I think I shouldn’t maybe have said, then to not write it at all.  Does that make me a bad or lazy writer?  Maybe.  But I think I can still write about all kinds of stuff using language other than curse words.

I read a lot of blogs.  The blogs I read are about all sorts of stuff like home improvement, parenting, and life.  A LOT of blogs use profanity and other crude language, to get their point across.  I’d even say more blogs than not use cursing frequently.   I still read some blogs, nice language or not.  But honestly?  If you can tell me a story or write about a subject without going down the potty mouth road, I’ll be yours forever. 

I’m not a prude.  There are millions words in the English language that we can use, many of which are rated G or PG.  For me, writing a blog that I’m not worried about Claire or Jenna reading (and suffering humiliation or learning more than they need to know), is much more important than sounding cool or edgy. 

What do you think?  Does cursing turn you off?