18. Well, Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo!

Today is 22 days from the first anniversary of Dad’s passing. I’ve committed to writing 40 stories about him as that day approaches. Forty Steady Stories.

I can count on two fingers the number of times I heard Dad cuss in all the years before I left for college. Twice. He may have said things when he was alone or with Mom, but he never cussed around us or in public. It was honestly one of the most remarkable things about him. I’m not saying he didn’t get angry, but when he did, the anger didn’t include normal expletives.

Dad did, however, make up words to express different emotions. For instance, if he hurt himself doing something he didn’t mean to, he might say “Geemoneemee!” If he hit his head on something, he needed to add a little extra, so it became, “Geemoneemee grunt!”

There are some other classic Steady words, but I’m going to focus on one time when he coined a word — or maybe it’s a phrase — that became legendary in the family.

Around 2005 I think, we were dealing with a tense family situation. Dad had become supremely frustrated to the point where he didn’t really want to talk about it. It needed to be discussed, so my brother and I decided to sit down and try to walk through identifying the real underlying problem and potential solutions. Dad didn’t want to discuss it, but we waded gently into the water anyway. We were trying to get him to see the other side of a family situation and something that needed to change. Part of what needed to change was Dad’s perspective.

When he finally realized that his thinking had been wrong on a significant point, he hit the escape button with a legendary word/phrase coined in the moment. He wanted to cuss SO badly but kept himself in check. Instead, he finally exclaimed in complete exasperation…

“Well, Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo!!!”

Whooptie what? My brother and I looked straight down at the floor. We knew Dad was REALLY ticked off, and we also knew if we took one look at each other after hearing that exclamation from Dad, we would have lost it laughing our heads off.

Well, we lost it laughing anyway in that moment, because, I mean, come on! Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo? That is hilarious! The cool thing was, that word completely diffused the situation because it was such a beautiful picture of frustration crashing into truth and popping out as humor.

So, my brother and I started laughing — just a little at first but then both completely lost it. Then, Dad realized how hilarious the moment was, and he started laughing, too. Pretty soon all three of us were uncontrollably laughing, slapping our knees, and trying to say “Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo” just one time without cracking up halfway through the word.

That word became the an instant argument-diffuser for years in our family. It still is even now, since we’ve passed it down to the next generation.

For Christmas one year, I had a wooden sign made for Dad with that word on it. I had it made at a Christian bookstore in Boone, NC, and it was a little tough telling them exactly what I wanted on the sign. (Actually, I messed up the ending on the sign when it was made, so that’s why it’s a different spelling.) They finally agreed to do it, and the guy who did asked me if he could make another one for himself!

That sign is right behind me right now on my home office bookshelf. It’s a great reminder to me every time I see it that humor, at its best, brings truth to bear on tough situations. It diffuses emotions and allows for things to get fixed between people. I can’t count the times in our family when humor has brought laughter into the room and has driven out frustration. Dad really set the standard for allowing well-timed humor to become much needed perspective in tense moments — for many more moments than just the one above.

So, with the holidays upon us, maybe you need to put “Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo!” in your family lexicon. It might just be the exact word needed in a particular moment this year. 

Now, if you don’t think that word is appropriate, then I would say in response to you, “That’s ok.” Or I might just say,“Well, Whooptiedadgumfreakindoo!”