Just That Simple

My friend Paul wrote me a pretty impassioned and articulate email regarding the word "fucktard".

He wasn't mean. He didn't judge. He simply typed his perspective and demonstrated his ability to see both sides of the coin.

There are many different things that affected me that day.

Perhaps his timing was aligned the way the universe wanted it. I really do not know.

His email hit my Blackberry while I was driving and because I didn't want to dismiss it and possibly forget to read it, I pulled over into the Shell station and read what he had to say. (It helped that the subject line was "Fucktard". Makes it difficult to ignore.)

Paul is not a confrontational person in general, so I knew I wasn't going to have my head ripped off. If I had thought I was going to, I probably would have put it off.

I'm glad I read it.

I didn't get his permission to repost it, so I won't, but I will say that every word penetrated me and brought me back to volunteering at the Seagull School and my years spent with sweet George, the 12 year old son of my then boyfriend.

George was a genius living with Autism and the child was simply amazing. He was brilliant and sweet and people were so mean to him, which did not sit well with me. He could hack into anything, and some of the phone calls we received from his school were pretty amusing.

I remembered a day in which George had come home and he had pulled his eyebrows out as a coping mechanism to inwardly deal with the stress of being picked on. He was also dosed on ADHD meds, so it was tough to pull it out of him. When we got him to stop rocking and got him to look at us, I could see every ounce of comprehension in that child's eyes that what they were doing to him was wrong and that it hurt. That being said, he didn't want us to fight his battle for him and he outwardly expressed this to me.

"Don't do anything, Cory. Let me fix it. I can fix it."

I believed him. His dad was generally less amused than I was when George would hack into the school's main frame or tell his bullies what was what, but we both adored him.

When I was going through chemo and laying on the couch, George hit me on the head with a hammer. He wanted to transfer my pain. (It worked.) I suddenly had a whopping headache and all the energy in the world to chase the little shit around the house until I could catch him and sit on him and tickle him while hovering a loogie over his face in case he thought such therapy would work a second time...

When I read Paul's email, I immediately thought of George.

It didn't take much before I had tears and snot dripping and wanted to talk about George and how much I miss him.

By that time, I could only type the simplest of emails...knowing that text would never convey all that was rolling around in my head.

I don't want to exploit that email or imply false depth. I do want to thank Paul again for taking the time to email me and I am stating here that the word "fucktard" is now officially stricken from my vernacular.

I do not feel bullied.

I do not feel like it is a PR move.

I simply heard the simple and complex (yes, sometimes things can be both) pain of a good person.

I cannot tell anyone else what words to use and I would be a hypocrite to attack anyone who does use the word. However, I will no longer use it myself and will not acknowledge it if used by others.

I will not publish comments using the word. This is my promise to Paul...and to George, who was never a fucktard, a retard, or a dastard...but who more often than not made me happier than custard.