Cussing is absolutely harmless. It has a cultural identity. It is a bond that common workers share. It is a sign of lower class angst. I admire cussers.

Of all the cussers I have met, the one I most admire is a good buddy of mine from high school. His name is Greg Motter. Greg is one of those guys who makes no apologies. His straight forward country manner belies his deep mental acuity. He gave me my first heavy construction job carrying concrete forms. It was a brutally difficult job but I got through it because of his guidance and good-natured ribbing.

Just about every other word that comes out of Greg's mouth is a cuss word. His favorite word is motherfucker. He isn't a belligerent cusser. (As soon as my wife walks in the room he shuts it off.) He is a consistent cusser. He is a creative cusser. I have no idea why he likes me. He and I are as different as night and day. But for some odd reason, we get along. I can always ask him his opinion if I want an unfiltered comment. He does not try to ease the pain when he tells you how full of shit you are. I sometimes think he cusses to hide his innate intelligence. When you lace your philosophical statements with vulgarities, the resulting commentary sounds less truculent. Less radical. More folksy. Almost sage.

Greg and I became close friends because of his sense of adventure and my eagerness to be led. He once decided to hitchhike to Atlanta to see Corndoggie. He asked me to come along. It was the early seventies and there was a preponderance of yippies, hippies and protestors of every ilk littering the highways. It was a trendy thing to do. It was also dangerous as it ever was.

As we struck out on our journey from Louisville to Atlanta, normally a six hour car ride, I grabbed my granddaddy's fedora and a few bucks. I was trying to become a hippie. I thought Greg was not hippie enough so I suggested he stand back and let me put out my thumb.

“I look more like a hippie,” I informed him. This was hilarious to Greg as it would have been to any casual observer. My hair was only slightly longer than Greg's and the hat had a comical effect. So I can imagine what we looked like to an oncoming car.

We stood out on I-64 with our thumbs out, walking backwards. Don't ask me why we chose to walk backwards instead of standing still. I guess we realized that we may have to walk all the way if we didn't get a ride. I know. Crazy.

After about an hour of getting nowhere somebody finally picked us up and the adventure was in full swing. It was an old beaten up station wagon with a married couple of hippies. They were trying to get us to share our weed and we were trying to get them to share their weed. After about 20 minutes of hinting around we finally realized nobody had any weed. It was a very pleasant ride. Everybody seemed full of hope and exuberance. But the ride came to an end all too suddenly when our benefactors informed us that they had to make a detour.

After they let us off at the ramp, we noticed they got off and right back on at the other side of the overpass. We realized that the need to score some free dope was foremost on their minds. Who could blame them?

This time our luck was not so good. We stood there for hours until just before dark when a Volkswagon bug pulled up. I clambered into the back and Greg sat up front. The driver, Bobby, was a young man in his thirties. He was very clean and neat, something you don't often find when hitchhiking. He talked a lot. He talked a whole lot. Occasionally, Greg would look back at me and snicker.

Somehow this asshole turned the conversation to guns. Greg and I became increasingly alarmed as he pointed out how easy it would be to kill someone on the highway and drop them in the ditch. It would be years before the body could be discovered. This kind of talk was bad enough but he eventually reached over to the glove box and pulled out a revolver. I believe it was a thirty-eight.

Greg and I totally freaked out. We were too scared to say anything. But finally Greg had the balls to say what I was thinking.

“Hey man. This is freaking us out. This is way not cool,” he said.

“Let us out, man,” I blurted out.

Then Bobby started to apologize. He explained that he was worried about me sitting behind him and worried that I might grab him and try to strangle him. That was why he brought out the gun. He was actually more afraid of us than we of him. He did a good job of convincing us that he had no violent intentions but that he had never picked up hitchhikers before and he figured the gun made him safe.

This nightmare drove home the stupidity of people who carry firearms. The whole thing could have ended tragically if I had freaked out and tried to grab the gun, which definitely occurred to me.

We calmed down and decided to stay in the car with him since he was going all the way to Atlanta anyway. He kept apologizing but it didn't matter. We were totally freaked out for the rest of the drive. It was the most unpleasant and scary time I ever spent hitchhiking.

When he finally let us out close to the campus at Georgia Tech, Greg and I couldn't get out of that car fast enough. As he patted the little Volkswagon on its backside and the car rolled away, Greg said, “Adios, motherfucker.” Then he turned to me wide eyed and seriously pale. “Son of a bitch,” was all he could say.

It was quite a rush. But the fear subsided almost instantly and we began to laugh, nervously at first. Soon we were rolling in the street in pain from the waves of hilarity. We dodged a bullet and we knew it. We got exactly what we had signed up for...an adventure.