If you were to ask me what my most used word was, I would probably say fuck. There is some scientific fact that my sister once blabbered on to me about saying that if you say a four letter word it helps relieve stress. However, the words fork or fold or felt don’t quite help get the edge off like the word fuck.You see I don’t dabble in dope or partake in PCP, I’ve never wielded weed, or lapped up liquor. Words are my drugs. When my breath begins to quicken and my heart starts to pound, I can say words out loud or write them down and, my heart beat gets softer and my breaths become deeper.
The only problem with this word is that not everyone appreciates it like I do. The other day I was babysitting five children all at once. Five children. By. Myself. One child was jumping on the couch, while another child was trying to get a snack. The third wanted to go outside, and children four and five were on top of each other kicking and punching. My hands started playing with each other. For a little bit, one hand pulled on the other hand’s fingers, cracking each one until they couldn’t pop any more. My brain started to leave me and it felt like my own thoughts were drifting away, all that was left were a bunch of scribbles that these children drew into my head. All I heard was the noise in the room. I heard the springs of the couch reverberating off each other. I heard the bag open and dump out pretzels onto the floor, pitter pattering every time they hit the floor. I heard one of the children screaming and begging and turning the doorknob back and forth while he moved his body in a swinging motion, causing a loud bang every time he hit the door or the wall. I heard another child laugh and cry out at the same time over the sound of skin meshing into skin and bones crunching into bones. Each sound got louder and louder until suddenly the only sound to be heard was my own voice shouting, “EVERYBODY FUCKING STOP!”
It’s safe to say I did not get asked to babysit again.
***
A week or so ago, lips were against my neck. They made their way over my collarbones, made circles around my chest, and glided down my stomach, they climbed their way up my inner thigh and as soon as they were at the area I wanted them the most, they moved back up to my lips. While these lips managed to do some good work, all mine could do was mutter the words, “fuck me.”
Last night I was stressed out about all I had to do this week. I had a doctor’s appointment early this morning, I have two tests tomorrow, a paper due at midnight, and to top it all off my goldfish died. According to my therapist, when I am stressed I tend to over eat, and boy oh boy did I eat. I had a whole medium pizza from Dominos, I had three snickers, and a bag of Reese’s. I forced this shitty food into my unwilling body. I hate eating in general. I usually barely eat. Some food comes in and I try to burn whatever I intake. But tonight, I messed up. I fucked up. The whole time my brain was shouting,
“Put the fucking snickers bar down and go on a run.”
Now that I’ve eaten it, all my brain can say is,
“Way to fucking go,”
“You fail every time,”
“You fucking ruined the diet you had been doing so well on,”
“What a fucking screw up,”
My response was,
“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.”
As I kept repeating these words, I laid on the ground and clenched my stomach with my arms. Not because my stomach was in pain from the food, but because it hurt so bad from all the guilt I was carrying for over-eating. All I could say to help ease the pain was, “fuck.”
Instead of taking a Xanax to calm down my anxiety, or making myself throw up the elephant I ate, I just cussed up a storm. Writing, in general, helps me deal with all the bullshit in my life. However, when I strike out during a big conference game, when I stub my toe on a table I should have seen, when someone is next to me, touching every inch of my body, the word fuck is the only one that can truly describe how I feel.
