southernisms | sweetness of the south pt.1

Hey, y'all! How's your Mama 'n 'em?

Do what? Come again? What a way to open a blog post!

I know it had been a month of Sundays since you'd heard from me last time I posted, so I decided to do another one right away. All summer I've been coming up with a list of things about the south I'd love to share with all y'all, but that would be the longest blog post ever so I decided to do a series of posts, starting with this one, which to me is the tune of the south.

I reckon I'm allowed to be proud of where I'm from because I was born and raised here, so don't pitch a fit if you happen to be from the north, bless your heart. You be proud of your heritage, I'll be proud of mine.

One of my favorite things about the south is the freely made up, strange, and never questioned expressions. Once you start using them they stick to you like stink on a hog, and never you mind if it's one you made up on the spur, sometimes you just gotta get your point across.

"The south is the one place nothing ever has to be explained to me." I know what all of these expressions mean, and if you think the ones you read here are silly things we only say once in a blue moon, then you've got another think coming. I've only included those I hear at least every week, if not every day.

In my family my grand parents have five kids and forty 'leven grandkids.  We all live a hoot 'n a holler away from them and when family get togethers come around we're up and at 'em because everyone brings a dish. We always bring plenty because there's a slew of people and we don't want to have to be scrounging around for extras when we're fixin' to eat. Lemme tell you what, you've never had rolls like my grandma makes. They're slap-your-mama good, and she's always got some on hand when we go over. We tend to pig out and get full as a tick, but we'll stop when we've had a gracious plenty. If you've never been to a family potluck, well I never. Y'all ain't right. 

You'd better watch yourself, or your Mama'll jerk a knot in your tail. I don't know how many times I've been told, "don't be ugly!" If you ever start thinking you're too high falutin' to heed that warning and get too big for your britches, then you're dumb as a box of rocks. You'll make your mama mad as a wet hen and get yourself chewed up one side and down the other.  If you don't straighten up you just might get her dander up and cause her to fly off the handle and lay into you quick as greased lightening. Then she'll be upset as all get out so nip it in the bud for heavens sake! Stop being such a persnickety knucklehead, you're getting us all discombobulated.

Manners are first and foremost and you must never let someone think you're speaking ill of a person. For example, "He's ugly as a mud fence, bless his heart." or "Poor thing, he's old as dirt and ain't got a stitch 'a hair." Compliment someone's cooking and you'll like to tickle them to death, but insult their sister and you'll tear them all to pieces and possibly cause them to have a come apart. Lord have mercy we wouldn't want that!  

My daddy always said that if you can't say nothing nice, don't say nothing at all, and Mama will tell you to hush your mouth when you start talking ugly because that one lady can't carry a tune in a bucket. Just don't cause a stink about it, ya hear?

When asked if you like the fruitcake when you've got a hankerin' for pie, say you surely do and thank you kindly, ma'am. You can wash it down with some sweet tea and go home in a little bit. 

Good heavens, it's hot! The humidity's getting on our last nerve. Summer is spent hay hauling, bean picking, chigger scratching, and spending most of your day in the humid, hotter than blazes out-of-doors. Shew-whee, by nightfall you feel like you've been chewed up and spit out, but just hide and watch us do it again the next day because we hang in there like a hair in a biscuit. Pretty soon we'll have put up all of the harvest and will be in high cotton, ready for bonfires and hay rides. Autumn will be here directly and we'll praise Jesus for the breeze.


Lord willing and the creek don't rise, we'll be having dinner on the ground once it cools off. Everybody'll be puttin' on the dog - girls  dressed pretty as a picture and the boys all decked out. Mama's are tickled pink when you act like you're somebody.

Well if that don't beat all - I've used a lot of southern expressions! There are so many I left out because there just isn't enough time!  Maybe there will be a second one on southernisms? Who knows?

There might be one or two that don't make a lick 'a sense to you, so just ask me and I'll try to explain them! And it's not just the old timers that use these expressions, I asked my friends which ones they used regularly and that's where most of them came from - and they're all under the age of 25!  (9 out of 10 of them said "bless your heart" is the one they use the most.)

"Goodness gracious, hun, I can't think of an expression on the fly like that!" But we did, and here they are.

Have a lovely day, darling readers. I'll see you shortly!