South in the Mouth

If you have never lived in or spent time in the South this might not make a lot of sense. The Southern region of the United States is very different from any other part of the country. And even within the South there are vast differences in culture and language.

I won't go into all of those differences, but you don't have to travel very far to experience them. When I was living in Tennessee and traveled to Western Virginia (NOT West Virginia) I noticed a difference in the pronunciation of certain words. The word house, for instance, sounds a little more like hoose. It's subtle, but I still knew they meant house. However, I've never been very good at deciphering the Mississippi dialect. I truly don't know what they are saying most of the time.

As I've moved around the country I've lost some of my accent, gained some of others, started pronouncing the g in words where I used to drop it, and lost a lot of the colloquialisms that I used to hear and use in every day conversations.

I revisit some of them when I talk to friends who still live there, or who have not lost as much as I have. And some of those words are still part of my internal dialogue. It's a lot like movie quotes that you want so badly to use in a certain situation, but you don't because you know that no one else is going to understand the reference and you will sound a little cray-cray.

But the other day one of them slipped out. It was as automatic as saying yes. And my husband looked at me like I was visiting from another planet.

We were having dinner. He said he had met with a guy that day, someone I know of but don't know well. Normally I would say something like, "Oh, so how's he doing?" or "Really? What did he have to say?"

Nope. I distinctly said, "Oh yeah? What'd he allow?"

My husband gave me the look and asked, "What did he what?"

In Southern speak that means what's new with him, or more specifically, what did he have to say.

Luckily I didn't take it further and say something like, "Oh, yeah? What'd he allow? I reckon all that jawin' musta wore you plum out."