Flashback from 1996: Forbidden Language
This piece is from a writing class at YSU on 10-1-96. The assignment was to write about your first experience with forbidden language.
I am the youngest of four siblings. I am the baby. My two older brothers were teenagers when i was just starting Kindergarten. They knew all that was adult and spoke about it in whispers behind closed doors. My sister, my idol, a whopping two years my elder, decided that the time had come for us to mature. We snuck as softly as ants on a Jello-mold to eavesdrop on our older and wiser brothers.
And then, amidst a flurry of gestures and words, it happened. My sister stifled a gasp. It was just a finger. Like any other. But this one… this one was definitely bad.
My sister, my idol, giggled about it when back in the safety of our room. I asked “Why?” I asked “How?” “It’s only a finger,” I said over again. She tried to explain, but i was barely five… the concept beyond my understanding.
“I’m asking Mom.”
She pleaded. She begged. Told me to hush. But i was stubborn in my ignorance.
I walked right up to Mom as she vacuumed the rug. Tap, tap on her leg was all that it took as she turned ’round to see a smiling me giving her the bird.