I love this particular young teen, with her angst about how her hair is too straight and her nose too crooked and there's a boy who says he likes her, although she could "care less."
She lives nearby, and I have watched her grow through nearly her lifetime of stages, the cuddly and quarrelsome, the alternately insecure and confident all easy to recall.
I'd have sworn I knew her nearly as well as my own daughters, but last week she surprised me.
She was sitting on a curb across the street with a bunch of other kids and, instead of offering my usual wave and a called-out "hello," I wandered over by them to chat for a second.
My eye was drawn instantly to her T-shirt, perhaps because I take great pleasure in reading those shirts that are clever or wise and hers was completely covered with words. It looked like it had plenty to say.
I'll bet my eyes got big as I read them.
Not one of them was a word you could utter on a regular television or radio broadcast. They've all been banned. They ranged from the merely very crude to the stunningly obscene.
I could not quote a single one of those words in this or any other daily general-circulation newspaper.
I was horrified. And genuinely surprised, as well, since that's not the kind of message I ever expected to see on this child or any other.
When I asked, she said she didn't pick the shirt. It was given to her by a 15-year-old cousin who bought it for her at a local shop.
I asked her not to wear it again — preferably ever. And certainly never to wear it when she comes to my house to play with my girls. I told her she should go home and change because those are not words any girl or woman should ever wear.
The terms emblazoned on her chest were nouns specifically derogatory to women. Demeaning. Nasty. Crude. Embarrassing.
Why a store would sell such a shirt — and especially to a minor — is beyond me.
There must be some demand for it, and that is, perhaps, the saddest part of all.
People would be horrified were a man to don such an anti-woman article of clothing. But this was designed as a style for women to wear, and the why of that is simply beyond me. I'm caught somewhere between sputtering and speechless.
You see it a lot these days, the shirts with "dirty" words or crude thoughts, although you'll have to trust me when I tell you this one was an extreme case. Never have I seen anything even approaching it.
I have always considered myself a proponent of free speech, but this style of self-expression leaves me wondering, what's the point? Why would anyone with even a tiny shred of self-respect purchase such a thing?
I don't think my young friend even knew what some of those words meant.
The cousin said she thought the shirt was "funny."
It wasn't. In a world where too many men, women and children are exploited, sexually assaulted, even murdered, there's nothing funny about reducing an entire gender to body parts and bodily functions and stereotypes.
And yet those words and others are creeping into our daily lives increasingly. It's fairly astounding what you hear on prime-time television. And crass is apparently the new cool when it comes to casual wear.
It's not bettering us in any way. It doesn't edify or enlighten or enliven or even genuinely entertain.
It is hate speech, directed inward.
Deseret News staff writer Lois M. Collins may be reached by e-mail at lois@desnews.com. Follow her on Twitter at @loisco.