File under “Foot, P-Word”: Pussyfoot is not a bad word.
I was in the audience at Memphis’s FedEx Arena, watching, of all things, a prize fight (lightweight championship of the world, mind
Bill Brohaugh
776
you). I was not there doing research for this book, but if I mention it here, perhaps I can use that trip to Memphis as a tax write-off. Somewhere around the ninth round, a woman behind me began getting restless. Neither fighter was taking control of the bout. The woman wanted to see some action. From thirty rows up, she screamed, “Stop P-word-footing around!”
P-word-footing?
Stop pussyfooting around—that’s certainly what she meant.
“Stop P-word-footing around!” she screamed again. And then, only a skosh more quietly, as she’d had perhaps a beer or seventeen, she turned to explain to a companion, “I don’t use the fucking P- word.”
I saw that night not only the crowning of the new lightweight boxing champion of the world, but perhaps the crowning of the new lightweight mis-etymological champion of the world, as well.
Pussyfoot is not a bad word, even though it is generally used derisively. To pussyfoot is to tread carefully, as on little kittycat paws.
By the by, I didn’t bother trying to define the word for this vocal boxing fan, nor did I point out to her that, by the by, the F-wording F-word is bad. It still boggles. Won’t say pussyfoot. Will say fuck. I shake my head.