Catch Jim’s podcast:  https://youtu.be/e9KrmDJ5uvE

or read his transcript:

JUST THE WRONG WORD AT JUST THE RIGHT TIME

I am idly scrawling, penknife-sharpened number-two pencil tightly clutched.

Even at this early age—a few generations back in time— I am an aimless writer of words. I note things I notice in this long-ago childhood southern village.

Even though my home back then is a modest bungalow, my parents tightly budgeted and careful about things like providing ample food and shelter for us kids, I am never in need of paper and pencil.

My masterly thoughts pour forth onto the backs of discarded family utility bills, advertising flyers, cancelled household checks, envelopes, whatever is handy. I live in a home where filling time with doodling and drawing and composing and reading is approved behavior.

Words and phrases are appearing on the page beneath my hunched-over frame. “I declare.” “I swan!” “I swanee.” “Sho’nuff.”

I like these words because they explain themselves, no dictionary needed. When Aunt Ann laughingly says “I declare!” it is clear that she is expressing amazement at something she just heard. Amazement and maybe a bit of disapproval.

When Uncle Brandon says “I swanee!” I know he’s basically substituting a phrase for something more colorful. Because he is around us little ones, his generation does not allow him to use profanity. He saves that for hunting trips with his buddies.

Every time Uncle Pat shouts “Sho’nuff!” I suppose that he is stifling a more dramatic phrase.

I make notes to verify all this someday when I become a full-grown scholar.

When someone says “Yikes!” it is immediately clear that amazement and humor are being conjoined.

When Mother says, “This ain’t the way you do that!” with a smile on her face, she is purposely using slang to make a point. She corrects us when we say ain’t, because she wants us to understand that her hero, Will Rogers, only used this word to elicit chuckles. In his newspaper columns, he employed both correct and incorrect expressions to make a point…and to let us know he knew better.

So, just sitting here bent over scraps of paper, getting ready to re-sharpen a number two pencil, I have already, this early in the day, learned a few things:

Different expressions, different dialects, can be tailored for appropriate audiences.

Surprisingly ungrammatical words become grammatical for a moment, mainly for effect.

A sense of humor can be used to teach harmless lessons, to gain attention, to force an unexpected laugh.

Some decades upon decades later, when I am setting down these thoughts for you, I smile at myself and realize that the world is still open for examination and subject to kindly criticisms and gentle corrections.

I may not be a world-famous writer, but my satisfaction comes from the momentary break in the day I bring to readers who could certainly use it in times like these.

I declare, it ain’t so bad, is it

© 2021 A.D. by Jim Reed