Lingo

Every profession has its own unique lingo.  A language that to an outsider sounds foreign but to a member of the elite group is a badge of belonging.  Take for example, my husband.  He is a Certified Public  Accountant and loves to “mock” the phrases that are a regular part of his daily grind.  “Don’t keep things close to the vest….we want you to speak off the cuff so we can opine on your ideas before running them up the flagpole to the President.”  Translation:  Don’t hold back, say what’s on your mind, so we can analyze them before bringing them up the chain of command to the President.  Then there is my sister.  She is a cop, well a detective (for more on her double life as a mother and detective check out her blog at http://mommyfive-o.blogspot.com/) and I am in awe of the “code” words that are a regular part of her job.  “10-4, I’m heading Code 3 to the 1096.”  Translation:  I understand, and I am driving with my lights and sirens on to the mentally unstable person.

Parents have their own lingo as well.  Mostly it centers around the various discipline techniques on the market.  There is the Supernanny warning prior to issuing a time out in the naughty chair, naughty rug, naughty corner, naughty bench, etc.  Then there is the counting: That’s 1, that’s 2, that’s three, take 5.  But the biggest sign of mommy and daddy language is the constant challenge of communicating with each other in the presence of your children without revealing to the child what you are discussing.  I quickly learned that my kids were born with a chip in their brain that allowed them to hear secret conversations between my husband and myself from across the house if it involved ice cream, carnivals, going to the park or anything else that would benefit them.  Which is amazing considering I asked Tyler to pick up his toys 3 times at close range today and he didn’t break his gaze from his new favorite cartoon, Chugginton.  As a result, we resort to spelling things.  “Honey, do you want to take the kids for I-C-E-C-R-E-A-M  after dinner?  It didn’t take long for Tyler to figure out what was going on.  “Mom, what do those letters spell?”  “Are we going somewhere fun?!”  When I am with my sister we talk in piglatin: “OO-day, OO-yay ant-way oo-tay ake-tay uh-they ids-kay oo-tay uh-they useum-may?”  Tyler runs up from the basement: “Can we go to the museum, Mom?  Can we, can we?”  (Damn that computer chip!)  So if we can’t spell or talk in foreign languages, what are we left with???  Motions and gestures like a game of charades?   Just this evening my husband started humping the air behind the kids’ backs as an invitation to get busy later on.  Frustrated by my lack of acknowledgement he resorted to our old lingo. “Do you want to have S-E-X?”  My response.  “No hablo Inglés.”