As with English, I’m assuming that other languages have idiosyncrasies. I mean little things that are… ummm… oddities? Idioms, maybe, can best describe what I mean. They’re little quirks that sound slightly off or are basically not understandable to a non-native speaker. They’re our little expressions.
A piece of cake.
Easy as pie.
It’s raining cats and dogs.
Tell someone with little knowledge of English to stop beating around the bush and they might glance down to find the bush to which you’re referring.
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In addition to those who are new to our language, this also applies to our children. Do you recall how old you were when you heard someone say quit pulling my leg? Were you young enough to have been confused? Did you wonder how someone could wrap their head around something without a tremendous amount of pain? Or, when someone walked into the room and another said, “Speak of the devil,” were you suddenly frightened that the devil had disguised himself as a family friend? Or maybe this person had, unbeknownst to you, always secretly been the devil? As for me, the first time I heard someone say that in my presence, I moistened myself, ran screaming from the room and hid under the tank behind the toilet with the trashcan on my head. But I’ll save that story for another time.
Suppose you heard your mom and her sister talking and your aunt said, “…before he even started, I cut him off at the knees…” Talk about a frightening mental picture as to the heretofore unknown violent nature of your sweet aunty!
Sometimes there are words alone that are confusing to a child. One I was always curious about was Twi-Night Doubleheader. Though they aren’t regularly scheduled in major league baseball any more, when I was a kid, they were fairly common. However, let’s say you’re five-years-old and you hear someone talking about a twi-night doubleheader. What kind of incredible, two-headed dragon or monster must that be?
Song lyrics constantly challenge people. Comedian Gary Mule Deer sings, You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille. With 400 children and cops in the field. People constantly mishear lyrics. I always thought Harry Nilsson said, “…skipping over the ocean like a storm…” instead of “like a stone.”
One of my favorite memories always comes happily to mind during the holiday season. When my son and daughter were very young, we were singing Christmas songs while cruising the freeways in my pickup truck. During a lull, my five-year-old-ish daughter turned to me and asked, “What’s skimoze?” I recall that I wrinkled my brow. I’d never heard that word before and I cast a questioning glance back at her.
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She said, “Skimoze. Skimoze!”
I looked past her to my son. When my daughter was around a year old, she’d blabber some words which her mother and I didn’t understand. We asked my son (who was approaching age four) if he knew what she’d said and he’d turn to her and she’d repeat her baby-speak. I remember one time when his frustration with us grown-ups was clearly demonstrated as he turned back to us and stated, as if we should have known, “She wants orange juice! Even though it was now four or so years later, I thought my boy might know what she was asking, but he shrugged his shoulders. I looked back to my daughter.
“Skimoze. Skimoze!”
I was totally flummoxed.
She finally sang, “…and folks dressed up like a Skimoze…”
Merry Christmas from my igloo to yours.
