Mt. Pleasant Classical Academy

A little over a year ago we were visiting my Dad, enjoying the State College Art’s Festival.   It seems like ions ago.   At one point Mark shared with my Dad that he didn’t like an expression that I was using.  “Granddad”, he said, ”Mom says CRAP all the time and I don’t like it.  It is a four-letter word too and she shouldn’t use it.”

Dad replied to his grandson, “Tell her you don’t like it, afterall,  An intelligent man does not need to use four letter words.”

Ahh, such an often heard saying through my teen years but never spoken to me.  Dad would say this to my older brother as he spoke those forbidden words, GOSH, DARN.   It was late in the 60’s and definitely a different world of forbidden four-letter words but the message resonated as my Dad repeated one of his favorite sayings:  An intelligent man does not need to use four letter words.

The only time I ever heard my Dad utter a four-letter word was when he was telling an off-color joke and that only happened well after I had kids.  Working as an engineer in the male-dominated engineering world and working in manufacturing meant too that I was not naive about the scope-and-sequence of four-letter words but my Dad’s saying resonated with me often as I listened to co-workers speak.  Oh I thought as I listened to the worst offender, my Divisional Manager John, if he only knew my Dad’s saying perhaps he wouldn’t pepper his language with all those F#(& and SH($.

I like the saying and as my boys approached their teen years I repeated my Dad’s saying to them.  This time however it was while we watched a TV show, or when we overheard some person speaking.  An intelligent man does not need to use four letter words.    We’ve had fun with the saying too; WAIT, Mom, you can’t say that word since it is a 4-letter word.  HAHAHA   The message has gotten to them though that an intelligent person would have a wide-range of words at their disposable to express their feelings and as such should not need to resort to using those F#(& and SH($.   I’m not going to sit here and try to get you to think that I’ve never used a four-letter word since sometimes the audience seems really to only understand four-letter words but they are few and far between for sure.   I do like that saying though and like that my boys have caught onto it too.

Growing up my parents had a couple more sayings that while heard were not repeated as often to us.  My mom often said;   If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.    I can’t ever remember saying this to my boys.  

My Dad ended most every meal with;

I’ve had an elegant sufficiency, any more would be an overabundancy

Nice intelligent words.