Sey Young: Think It Over

Sey Young: Grandpa's cussing a shock

Family today just too bland

I heard my very first curse word from my grandfather when I was 8 years old. Now, don't get me wrong; I had heard the odd profanity here and there on the school bus or on the school playground, so I was no stranger to what my mother called vulgar language. But growing up, my father never even so much as used the word "heck," my mother prided herself on proper language, and Sundays were spent on a hard pew at the Baptist church. So, it took a summer visit to see my grandparents in St. Petersburg to expand my vocabulary horizons.

I was sitting with my grandfather watching a baseball game on the television one beautiful Saturday afternoon, the rest of the family having gone off on various other entertainments. Suddenly we heard the loud sounds of bus air brakes hissing to a stop out in front of the house. Looking out, my grandfather and I watched a thin, graying woman get off the bus, carrying a large package with a ribbon around it. " * * * *!" came a four-letter epithet out of his mouth. "It's Esther!" he next exclaimed in a voice that seemed to combine despair and disgust in a single emotion. I was thrilled. It seemed that a whole world previously unknown was opened to me. My Pop had said a curse word!

Esther was my grandfather's younger sister. After her husband died, she came up with the ingenious plan of having free meals and lodging most of the year. She would take an old department store dress box and fill it with two weeks of clothing. Then she would descend on various relations in and around St. Pete, via the city bus. Surprise was obviously a key component of her game plan, and apparently, she had not adequately spaced out the last visit.

Thriftiness ran in that family. When his mother died, my grandfather and his brother Lloyd built their father a garage apartment at Lloyd's house for him to live in. My grandmother would save a week's worth of the St. Petersburg Times for him to line the entire apartment floor with newspaper. Once a week he would throw the old papers away and reline his floor with fresh paper. Housekeeping complete.

Uncle Lloyd was an interesting man in his own right. He ran a trading post out in the Everglades for years as a young man, trading with the Seminole Indians for fish, pelts and an assortment of contraband. Later he and one of his sons built a landing strip out in the Glades and charged planes landing fees with no questions asked as to their destination or cargo. He finished out his life managing a motel in Key West that was popular with the Navy sailors stationed there. Now that's an uncle!

My grandfather's older sister in St. Pete was named Fleeta. A big-boned, plain-faced woman, she was a mystery to me; she had been married five times. Her charms escaped me as she seemed very severe, unfriendly to children, and had no apparent sense of humor. She spent her days knitting doll clothes for the extensive collection of 12-inch plastic dolls she displayed in every room of her small house, all dressed in every conceivable nursery rhyme story setting and many military figures from history to boot. She didn't sell them, just churned them out like an assembly line. And absolutely no touching!

All are long gone now, replaced by a bland but respectable bunch of relatives who drive Teslas and eat kale. They don't even cuss. My poor kids.

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