Whatever

A few weeks ago, Joe tossed a "whatever" off, sounding for all the world like he was some snotty valley girl.  Julie sharply told him she didn't like that word as she simultaneously wondered which friend from school was saying that.

It was maybe only a few days later that she heard herself toss a "whatever" off, sounding for all the world like some snotty valley girl.

Fans, do you remember, from the heyday of the War of Drugs, the Partnership for a Drug Free America TV ads?  There was one that featured a teen boy lounging around on his bed when his mustachioed dad bursts in with a cigar box of drug paraphernalia and demands to know who taught his son to do this stuff.  The kid bursts out with (and Fans of a certain age can probably recite this right along with us): "It was you alright!  I learned it by watching you!"  Cut to shot of mustachioed dad looking stricken, and the statement "Parents who do drugs have children who use drugs."

Julie felt like that stricken dad, sans mustache.  She was the snotty valley girl!  Like, OMG.

So she's been making a conscious effort to stamp "whatever" out of her speech.  There is, of course, nothing like a pre-schooler to keep you honest.  The other night, Julie arrived home with the bambini and said to Joe something like, "Be sure you've got your hat and mittens and whatever!"  This would be an appropriate use of the word whatever--that is, it is not being used to dismiss someone like a snotty valley girl, but rather to refer collectively to the flotsam and jetsam of treasures that might be hauled home from daycare.  But Joe stopped dead in his tracks and said, "Mommy, you don't like that word.  That word is closed in this house."

Whatever.