My grandmother is her own Emily Post.
I find it to be quirky and endearing in a way that always causes me to think to myself, “Oh, that’s just grandma,” with a smirk.
From the time I can remember first knowing her until now she has been regulatory in her insistences that I (and I am sure many others in my family) do or not do the following things.
Do stand up straight: nearly every time I see her she will physically correct my posture by forcing my shoulders behind my head as though I were a ballerina.
Do not do anything that could offend Jesus: For her this ranged from unintentional blasphemy (Jesus wouldn’t find it funny) to sibling arguments (Would Jesus treat his sibling like that?) to bodily gas (What would Jesus think?).
Do not drink all of our Coke: Seriously, I was secretly throwing back about five cans of Coke a day at the age of 10. I’d sneak into their cold garage where the soda was stockpiled, grab as many cans as my arms could cradle, and hide myself in some unknown region of their shag carpeted mansion to play with barbies, stare at flecks of dust in the rays of sun that poured in through their arched windows, imagine myself an astronaut and binge drink Coke. I was found out and Coke cans were inventoried afterward.
Do act like a lady: For this see everything in the do not offend Jesus category.
Do not engage in superfluous use of the word ‘like:’ You know, like, he was totally like watching like Valley Girl.
On the last point, the word ‘like,’ my grandmother and I have to disagree. You see, I say ‘like.’ Not a lot, but just enough to raise her brows to it.
Story time: There we sat Christmas day in the house where in all reality I should have become a diabetic for all the soda I secretly drank. We were all eating and I was telling a story to my cousin’s boyfriend when I could hear my grandma at the table.
“Mumble mumble.. Like… mumble… overuse.”
I turned, “Are you saying I use the word ‘like’ too much?”
And as she nodded, another cousin of mine said something to the effect of, “people who use it like that probably have a bad vocabulary.”
There is one thing I truly take pride in, and that is my wordsmithing abilities. I know a lot of words. I like a lot of words. I like to discover new words and throw them into my word rotation. I even like to know where words come from. And I live in this world of word-love not in the way of a Valley Girl character trying to better herself with vocabulary expansion, but instead as someone who just so happens to enjoy writing, and who is employed, among other reasons, because she has the ability to do so.
And yet, I use the word “like.” So which is it? Am I a dumb dumb, or are they wrong?
Pretty sure my response was something along the lines of, “Um… no… I definitely have an extended vocabulary, and I do use the word ‘like.’”
Solid argument, right?
Actually, it was. At least for my family, who knows that words fly off my tongue like ninja chops from Bruce Lee’s fists of fury.
So I won’t worry about the word like being thrown around in what I say. But, it is nearing New Year’s Eve and perhaps there are some things I should resolve to do.
To be continued…
