Known by all as Miss Lena, Mama was a true Southern lady. She rarely engaged in gossip, but when doing so, she prefaced her comments with, “Bless her heart” or “Bless his heart,” terms Southerners have always used when gossiping.
Even so, she would not allow her six head of kids to gossip, warning that anyone who gossips with you will gossip about you.
And if using the word “dammit” is sinful, that is as far as Satan ever tempted her when it came to cursing.
Bless our hearts, if one of us six kids slipped and said, “I’ll swear,” we knew the dreaded willow switch would re-design our rear ends with red stripes. If we intended to violate the Bible’s mandate not to swear, she would only allow us to use the phrase, “I’ll swunnee.”
Not long ago, I was chatting with a group of co-workers. Among them was a freshly transplanted Yankee woman from Boston named Gretchen. Bless her heart, when she began gossiping about another co-worker not in the group, I looked at her with a tinge of incredulity and said, “I’ll swunnee.”
“Geez,” she retorted, “you guys down here mutilate the English language! What in the world does ‘I’ll swunnee’ mean?”
After I explained its Southern etymology, she launched into a harangue about the possibility that her children would adopt phrases like “fixin’ to,” “y’all,” “over yonder,” and “bless his heart,” or using the word “right,” as in “riiiight niiiice” or “riiight funny,” and worst of all, might begin to slough off the ends of words and drawl, as folks raised below the Mason-Dixon do.
“Heaven forbid that my highly intelligent children will begin to sound ignorant by ‘taaaalkin’ liiike theeiss,’” she moaned.
I couldn’t resist trading an insult for an insult. Cranking up my best deep-South drawl, I said, “Bless yo’ heart, honey chile, you mought oughta considuh movin’ back Nawth to Bawstun, where all those folks blessed with superior intelligence would nevuh even considuh movin’ down heah.”
Caught off guard, she gave me a scornful touché glance, but refusing to be outdone, began criticizing God’s greatest gift to mankind: Southern females.
“Southern girls are taught to flirt from an early age, and by the time they get to college, they have honed that naughty skill to perfection, just so they can capture Mr. Rich, Richer, or Richest, and earn the only degree they’re smart enough to earn — an MRS degree. And most of them are such airheads that they can’t remember names and merely refer to everyone as “Honey,” “Dahlin,” or “Shugguh.”
Then she glared at me and said, “How do you respond to that, Mr. Rhett Butler wannabe?”
“Bless yo’ heart, Ma’am,” I drawled, “you’re just jealous because Yankee women don’t even come close to having the beauty, charm, personality, and intelligence of GRITS.”
When I explained, she muttered a few expletives under her breath and departed, most unladylike.
What I said was, “Miss Gretchen, GRITS stands for Girls Raised In The South.”
Jimmy Reed is an Oxford, Mississippi resident, Ole Miss and Delta State University alumnus, Vietnam Era Army Veteran, former Mississippi Delta cotton farmer and ginner, author, and retired college teacher.
This story is a selection from Jimmy Reed’s latest book, entitled The Jaybird Tales.
Copies, including personalized autographs, can be reserved by notifying the author via email (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)).
