In a word, I'm still not from around here
My friend is reading my manuscript and we talked about it for an hour or so this afternoon. She paged through and mentioned things she'd noted, such as specific words that didn't work for her.
I grew up all around the country (and no, I wasn't a military brat--it was worse, I was a "PK," or preacher's kid). I learned and relearned slang and other vocabulary each time I moved, as well as changed my wardrobe to suit the bratty kids who teased me about my clothing, too.
When I came to Texas from Colorado to go to college, I had to learn to drop the g's from -ing verbs, because people laughed hysterically at my roommate and me when we were speakin' so formally. (She was from Denver, too.)
I learned to say y'all instead of you guys (but NEVER yous guys!!) as often as I could, although you guys has come into fashion even in the South finally, and I probably say it more often than y'all these days once again. I learned to say cokes instead of pop, and I am forever fixin' to do something rather than getting ready to, of course.
When I moved from Texas to Alabama for a couple of years, I learned that the plural of y'all is all y'all. I learned that when people called my two-year-old daughter groany they were really saying growny and that she was "You know, 'grown up' actin'," and not whiny. And that when she was ill, she was whiny, not sick, and didn't need tylenol for that. I was about ready to turn a lady in to child protective services when I asked what was wrong with her daughter, who had her head down and was covering her face, and she kept telling me, "Oh, nothin', she's just ill," but didn't seem interested in doing anything about it.
Anyway(s), you get the picture.
So, today, I learned I've been saying something all these years in Texas that nobody else says, and nobody has ever bothered to let me know until today.
Gail: I don't think a child from Texas would say "tennies." I didn't really know what you meant at first.
Julie: Huh? Tennies? You've never heard that?
Gail: Well, only from you. I think that might be a Colorado thing or something.
Julie: No way. Girls?! Come here (calling to daughters). What do you and your friends call your tennis shoes?
Girls: Tennis shoes? Maybe sneakers? Gym shoes? Athletic shoes?
Julie: Am I the only one in Texas who says "tennies"?
Girls: Yes. Except us, because sometimes we say it to you.
Oh. my. goodness. I had no idea.
But look. It is right here.
More than 20 years in Texas, and nobody ever set me straight until today.
posted by Julie Kibler @ 2:00 AM
6 comments
6 Comments:
Always called them "tennies" in California. :) Everything else sounds so formal. Ha!
That's funny! I think I've finally gotten to the point -- between time in the military and living in a fairly mobile kind of world -- that I can't tell what's local and what's not anymore. I've been in Colorado since 1989, but Colorado Springs had 5 military bases, so meeting a native was unusual.
The only time I had to work hard to purge my vocabulary of laughable phrases was when I joined the Air Force in 1980. Having grown up in and around Boston, I sounded a little like Cliff Clavin from Cheers and every time I opened my mouth, people erupted into peals of laughter and begged me to repeat phrases that had "r's" in the middle of them.
The adjective I had the "haaadest" time getting rid of back then was "wicked". :)
So, see, I'm not crazy, I'm just a California girl at heart. Or not...
I'm actually leaving for Cali first thing tomorrow, and while I enjoy my vacations there, I get a little claustrophobic, and I'm always ready to get back to the occasional open space. Well, lots of open space, actually. :)
Lisa, my mom claims accents have gradually disappeared because of television. We all talk like the people we hear on TV. And speaking of miliary, I've always told people I have a "military accent," even though my dad wasn't. You adapt to whatever is around you, often even just for a few minutes. I can't help talking like the people around me.
My mom still gets her New Mexico accent going when she talks to relatives on the phone. Hilarious. (Yes, there is even a NM accent!)
When I was in Boston a few years ago, I was in the aquarium and this guy kept talking about the "Shahk." Hehe!
Sorry Jules. I've just been so used to you saying tennies that I never thought about telling you it was not common around these parts. I can usually spot someone who is "not from these parts" by one or two words that may crop up in their speech, but we try not to teast you northerners too much. When I went back to Cali to visit in the 8th grade with a friend, all her friends kept wanting me to talk so they could giggle at my Texas accent, but I very quickly slipped into the California accent I had when I lived there in the first and second grade.
Haha, Jay and I have been laughingly quoting a few lines from The Departed (or The Depahted) in our best Baaahhston accents . . . however they are not fit to quote here. But they are dang funny . . . all lines said by Matt Damon, a born and bred Bostonian I believe.
Right you ahhh, Gail. He is indeed a son of Southie as is Ben Affleck, if I'm not mistaken and as are the Wahlbergs.
I'm a stickler for movies set in Boston -- the actors either nail it or I'm complaining the whole time :)
They did ok in "Gone Baby Gone", but not great. Sean Penn and the gang were all great in "Mystic Rivah".
It's amazing how many words just seem second nature to me and then, well, they're not. I grew up in the midwest, lived briefly in LA (where nothing is "normal"), lived for 10 years in Alabama, moved back to the midwest for seven years and now live in Texas. My latest WIP is set in Dallas and I wrote the word "dressing" to describe the side-dish served with turkey at Thanksgiving. My critique partner said, "Isn't it 'stuffing'?" But since she's from the east coast, we had to ask my husband, the native Texan. It was dressing. But who knew that might have been a regional thing? I grew up with "pop," called it "coke" in Alabama and now here it's called "soda." Weird...
Don't get me started on some of the weird words that seem unique only to my extended family. My mother's family came here from Holland, and we have words I've never heard ANYONE use.
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