The Children Are Cursing on the Playground

The children are cursing on the playground — almost all of them. And, I wish that this were hyperbole or clickbait or a tool used for shock. But it isn’t. It’s a sad, glaring, unthinkable truth. They are cursing. The children… Our children… And most of them look like me. The babies… They are cursing…

The babies are cursing on the playground.

Last year I was so thrilled to see children on the playground. As an educator and as someone who had always tried to stay closely connected to the youth of our communities I’ve been inundated, since having taken my first teaching job in 2009, with stories of teens glued to screens. A technology apocalypse has been forecast for decades now: tv, the internet, social media, and now AI was sure to mean societal doom — apparently.

But now; I’m not so sure. These days I play with my 18 month old son on the playground and I listen closely to the tale that’s being told on the streets of common man. One 12 year old shows me the first clue, “I cursed that girl up. She’ll cursing think before she cursing looks at me crazy again.” And another child, this sweet girl adorned with hijab and head jewels, “What the cuuuuuuuuuuurse, are we going to start the mother-cursing game, or not?” And a small boy, who can’t possibly be older than 7, in an altogether different conversation with an altogether different group of children speaks, in such a matter-of-fact way that it took me by the most surprise, “These fat curses are ugly as curse. I’m not cursing with no ugly, fat, curses.” And after he speaks these horrific words, he teeters back off into a game of climbing up the slide and jumping off the top. For this sweet boy, and all of the other children (it seems), foul language is just another part of play… and life. There are no cell phones being used on this playground. I see no signs of an impending technology apocalypse. But, there are glaring signs of impending doom nonetheless.

The children are cursing on the playground. And, for me, it begs the questions — who taught these children these horrible words, and where are these children’s parents, and because I can see the parents sitting all around the playground (mostly on their phones) why aren’t the parents correcting their children? Then again, a child who curses with such mastery is perhaps a professional. Maybe the parents curse with the children at home. Maybe the parents curse at the children at home. Maybe the parents are too exhausted to move, or correct, or think, or be… Most of the parents are at the playground emptying out on the park benches, scrolling aimlessly on their phones, hoping that somehow these few minutes on the playground will carry them off into a quiet, serene, hope-filled place, far away from their reality, far away from more news of

President Trump’s latest this-and-that, far away from 10 dollar eggs, far away from job layoffs, far away from families of 7 living in 2 bedroom apartments, far away from children— cursing on the playground —- reminding them that, perhaps, they’re failing, in many ways, and maybe the most important too.

Still, I wonder is this a good excuse? You can not pour from an empty storehouse — this is true. But still, our babies need to eat. So, what do we do?

I don’t have any answers. I only have observations and hopes.

I notice, now more than ever, with a 18 month old boy in tow, that the children are cursing… And, they aren’t just cursing. They’re hitting. They’re drawing graphic images of body parts on the underbelly of the igloos. The children are laughing until they cry at jokes about violence and murder. And yesterday, though I was pushed about 20 times to be moved out of the way of an ongoing game of tag, only one sweet child stopped to say — excuse me ma’am. And to be clear, I am in an auntie vibe era — there is no mistaking that I. Am. A. Ma’am.

So, here are my hopes — I wake up almost every morning to my sweet son screaming, “DAHHHH!!!” At the top of his lungs “DAHHHHH!” And still another, “DAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH”

He continues, “DAH! dAAAAH! Dah-dah! Dadadadadadadada.”

Until there’s finally a reply. My husband —Rob— always comes to Sunday and replies gently and sweetly, “Yea!?” And then our baby’s laughter or gibberish or a loud bang because he threw a toy. It’s really just so sweet.

Sunday (my son) can’t curse just yet. His tongue and mind and heart and soul are still baby, innocent, untainted… That baby and child period used to last longer — I mean, my memory serves children well into high school still watching the Disney channel and loving Boy Meets World with its underlying ethical and moral lessons in each episode. But, those days are gone.

So, I hope that our small family will move, before Sunday is older, to a place where the community values children and protects them at all costs. What comes out of the mouth is an indication of what lies inside of the heart, and I fear that the real apocalypse is what we are allowing to grow and take root in the bellies of our babies. I hope that Rob and I can continue to say enough sweet words to our son that, perhaps, those sweet words will fill him up and, perhaps, those sweet words will be the ones that take root in our sweet boy and eventually spill out. I hope that I’m able to fight against the hopelessness that is getting darker, thicker and stronger all around me so that it won’t get inside of me, so that I am able to play with my baby on the playground instead of emptying into my cell phone screen because the world has beaten all signs of life and joy out of me (to that end, I keep my tv off and I am not active on social media). And lastly, I hope… I pray… that I am not the only one hoping for these things because though I only have one sweet boy right now, he’s not the only child in the world, he’s not the only child on the playground, and I can’t save the whole playground, at least not alone.