Spring has officially sprung. My garden is stretching and yawning itself awake. Bulbs are bursting, birds are nesting, and teenagers are giggling incessantly on the square. Yes, spring has most definitely arrived, and everywhere I look, I see twitterpation.
What's that? "Twitterpation" is not a word? Of course, it is; it's simply a derivative of the word "twitterpated."
"Twitterpated" is a not word either, you say? That's true, to an extent -- but have you not seen the film Bambi? It wasn't a word until it was, and now it is, you see.
You don't see. Well, it's a wonder I know any words at all, given my family's affinity for misusing, misspeaking or making up words entirely. I'm not sure whether their lack of a formal education or pure stubbornness was the root cause. In any event, I've had fascinating vocabulary lessons to unlearn over the years.
Many of these vocabulary lessons were taught by my maternal grandmother, Ruby Nell Forrest, during summers I spent as a child in her liquor store, a stone's throw from the Clay County line in northeastern Arkansas. Having but an eighth-grade education, the redheaded vixen had a way of saying things with such confidence that, even if you knew she was wrong, you questioned yourself more than her.
Ruby and I would spend countless hours talking, and she'd say things such as:
"This hair a'mine. I'm so flustrated I can't keep a curl in it. I've got to get me a permalet."
"Lisa Lynn, look out there. Passed the chimley. You see the forsynthia blooming?"
"Your uncle got him a motorsickle. A Harley, I think."
"What's the capital of Missouri (correctly pronounced "'Mizz-er-uh' in our locality)? Jeff City, that's right. What's the capital of Massatwoshits (incorrectly pronounced in any locality)? Boston, atta girl."
I was a freshman in high school, standing at the lunch counter beside a boy with whom I was close friends -- and secretly smitten. He was handsome, top of our class, center of the football team and a genuinely nice guy. We were chatting as usual, when he turned to me with the funniest expression.
"What did you just say?" he asked.
"Flustrated," I replied.
"That's what I thought!" he laughed. Seeing my oblivion, he kindly corrected, "You know that's not a word, right? It's 'frustrated' or 'flustered,' but not both together."
"Well, I AM both together!" I announced, feeling my face redden.
Somehow, I'd managed to make it to the ninth grade and not know that some of the words I learned as a child weren't words at all. I explained this to my grandmother. I explained there's no "N" in forsythia; there IS an "N" in chimney and permanent; it's a motorCYcle (although "bicycle" didn't help my cause); and I didn't know where to begin with Massachusetts.
Ruby looked at me sternly and said: "You know full well what I mean," and proceeded to speak as she always had.
I smile every spring when the forsynthia blooms and folks get twitterpated. Just so nobody gets nekkid in the publix.
NAN Our Town on 03/28/2019