Don't say bleep at Christmas

I'M NOT A big fan of people who swear a lot. I am not normally a potty mouth. Sheryl can cuss like a sailor and struggles to not bleep, but I try to keep my bleeps to a minimum. I don't put swear words in this blog unless it is part of a tale.

At Christmas, I let one slip. And I'll probably hear about it for years.

We did the family Christmas thing at Sheryl's father's house in Quincy. I like Jerry, and I think he likes me. Sheryl's relationship with her father is a little more complicated, but I don't mind hanging out with her family. To say Jerry is conservative is like saying Rush Limbaugh won't signal to turn left. And he's a church-going man who takes his faith seriously, and wishes his kids and their significant others would also.

Things were going fine until we started talking about baseball. Jerry is a life-long Cubs fan, which puts him at odds with some of the family and their Cardinals. We were talking about how much it costs for tickets and the overpaid players.

"Well," I said. "I don't give a shit about baseball, and blah blah blah blah."

My favorite team. Long gone.

I put "blah blah blah" because I'm not sure what I said after the cuss word. But I do remember there was a moment of shocked silence. A hush fell over the daughters, sons-in-law, nephews, nieces, boyfriends and step-mother. For a second, I thought it was about defaming the Cardinals (around here, that gets you in trouble, which is even more reason to hate them). Jerry looked at me sort of funny, but suddenly continued the conversation as if nothing unsavory had been uttered.

A few hours later, his grandson, Evan, was at our house and started laughing as he recounted the conversation.

"Wow. You said 'shit' in front of grandpa," he said. "I don't think we've ever said 'shit' in front of GRANDPA."

So I'm a strange kind of a hero with some of the family, and Jerry probably won't bring up baseball with me again. Or invite me back for Christmas. Although Sheryl thinks he would rather have me at Christmas than her.

I promise to clean up my act. I will not swear again in front of my father-in-law. My own family? Well, bleep them. They can deal with it.

Bleep. I bleeped again. Stop it! It's all your fault, baseball.