"Wash Your Mouth Out With Soap"...by Gina Waite

I’m thinking it’s about time I go wash my van! I realized this the other day when I accidentally brushed my leg against the side of my Idaho-Spring-christened car, and my lightly colored pastel pants ended up looking a whole lot more grey than pastel! All my car needs is a fine Spring Day, A LOT of soap and elbow grease! I've got the soap and elbow grease AND it just so happens that the weather prediction for the week suggests I just might get that fine Spring day!!! Which reminds me of a fine Spring day in May of 2003 when my kids and I embarked on a little journey to wash the car and, much to my surprise, ended up washing more than my car…I washed someone’s mouth out with soap!


Like any other human being…not ALL the words that escape my lips are worthy of the highest praise! I wish I could say I’d never used a colorful metaphor…BUT alas…I must plead the fifth and hope you can forgive me. Swear words happen, and they happen to the BEST of us! …but on that aforementioned day in May…I’m not certain I would classify, the young man in the car next to me as the BEST of us. Readied for a verbal fight and idling in the car next to me…this young man had eased up on my right side to make a right-hand turn. As I was turning left and my car positioned a little closer to the intersection than his, I could only make out that the modest car was filled with as many sweaty, swearing sidekicks as could possibly fit into a two-door econo-car!

Though his car was modest, his music and language would suggest otherwise. For as we sat there idling next to each other…the driver turned down his decibel deafening music and started to shout obscenities at me due to the fact he could not see beyond my vehicle. My windows down and in perfect earshot of what was being said, my son started to ask me the meaning of the words that were flying out of the driver next to me’s, mouth! A realization entered my mind: the driver, young, entitled and in need of a courtesy lesson…sat in perfect trajectory of my windshield wipers faulty spray nozzle. (I was pretty familiar as to the trajectory of the faulty spray nozzle, as just the week before discovered it when an accidental spray-my-husband-as-he-walked-to-the-right-side-of-the-van…on our way to church…happened!)


With a strong conviction that I was doing the best thing…and the help of the Mission Impossible soundtrack playing loudly in my mind...I hatched a plan: I would time it so that as I turned left (and the driver would not have clear view of the oncoming traffic until I turned left) I would engage my windshield wipers…enhanced with the washer fluid…and turn left just as the traffic would not allow anyone to follow behind me! As the young teen continued to interlace every other word with a colorful metaphor…I waited and timed my exit, with windshield wipers and washer fluid engaged, perfectly…and actually hit my target! For as I drove away, I saw in my rear-view mirror, the foul-mouthed young man…spitting out the washer fluid that had just hit him in the face and all the occupants of his car, laughing hysterically!


Now, I must say, as I drove away and my four year old son shouted, “You got him, Mommy…you got him,” I did feel a sense of obligation that I should have handled that situation a little better…but in the end it ALL comes down to this: Do not swear around little, innocent children…cause if you do, and I’m there, you may just get your mouth washed out with soap!

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