Shock!

Not a lot of things shock me ya know. I pretty much feel like I’ve seen it all, heard it all. I nearly got myself run over by a car a few months ago and that was quite shocking, but not the kind of shock I mean. I mean when someone does something/says something and you’re just at a loss for words, it’s so unexpected.

But a few days ago I was walking down the street with my friend Lynn, just chatting about all kinds of crap, when some ten year old girls came walking towards us. As they passed there was a lull in our conversation, so we could hear the girls quite well. The tallest one said “And then all the bitches and ho’s said . . .” Shock! What ten year old girls could be bitches and ho’s? And where did these bitches and ho’s appear? Was it some other ten year old’s birthday party? Were they smoking dro as well?

I feel old. Oh my god, from being all Grrlz! and doing so much work around ageism, now I too have got these dumb ideas of what children and teenagers are all about. I’m looking back with rose-tinted glasses, imagining a far less complex state of affairs for that horrendous coming of age we all go through. So many things are going on in a person’s life at that age, issues of sexuality are starting to loom, you’re trying to find independence and a voice, and grown ups keep trying to pen you in like they did when you were three, only with societal norms instead of a play pen. It’s all so complicated. And you’re body is transitioning into it’s adult form, and aaaaaah! So then you’re just working off some steam using some lingo you heard on an Eminem record “and then all the bitches and ho’s said. . .” and you end up shocking some twenty-something bulldagger with tattoos and a red hanky sticking out of her pocket.

What a world!

Of course what you all want to know now is “What did all the bitches and ho’s say anyway?”

I’m a terrible blogger. To tell you the truth I don’t know, by then they had walked past us and I was still in shock.