BLOGGING IS BAD FOR MY IMAGE

Once upon a time, I was known for my pure heart. I rarely cursed out loud and never before 4pm. I never told lies because my face gives me away and I never had more than 10 items in the express lane at the supermarket.

I have been known to make a return trip to a store if I discovered that I had not been charged for an item. My nickname at my previous employment was Mary Martha because they said I was Martha Stewart and Mary Sunshine all wrapped up in one person and they didn’t mean it as a complement. If we had a particularly difficult client issue, they would say, “Send in Mary-Martha. Nobody gets mad at her.” What can I say, I’m a people pleaser, people. I’m not comfortable offending people. And I’m hard to offend.

Then I began to blog. Suddenly the words that had always been perfectly content to reside only in my brain were spilling out onto the pages. I swear like a drunken sailor in my head but those bad words used to only come out verbally if I dropped something on my foot or you beat me in a card game. WTF and FML have become common place in my instant messaging. My daughters want to know who I am and what I’ve done with their mother.

There’s a trickle down effect at play here. I have a NO CURSING policy in my office. I have a point system like NASCAR. The front desk girl is a native New Yorker. Shhhhh, they don’t like it when you stereotype but those people take cursing to a whole new level. I’m always taking away her points. But the system is flawed. It’s hard to enforce such rules when the head honcho (Dr. Boobiologist, also a New Yorker) hangs up the phone and says, “Effin B*tch!” (Only she doesn’t say “effin” if you get my drift.) Of course she is usually referring to some medical director of an insurance company who won’t approve a diagnostic test. No points deducted for that. Totally justifiable cursage. But I digress.

I now find myself in the embarrassing position of having my own points being deducted as my blogging language is seeping into my work life. Leadership by example has gone to hell in a hand basket. And my kids no longer believe that I would never cheat them in Monopoly because they no longer believe that I am pure of heart. And that’s CRAP! I’m still a goody two-shoes. I am still pure of heart. I’m still a nice girl. I swear! Yes.I.do. So what!

And sometimes I may or may not mis-count the items in my cart when I enter the express lane at the grocery. And if that girl at TJMaxx misses ringing that pair of socks, it wouldn’t be right to jeopardize her job by pointing out her mistakes, right? Oh and that 4pm rule? We’ve moved that back to noon. That’s respectable, right?

And it all started with a blog.

Hugs,

Smart Mouth Broad