Embarrassing!

If my understanding of the English language causes surprise in my stepdaughter by colliding with her generation's understanding of various words, imagine what my older friend's comments do to me.

I have a wonderful friend who is 83 years old. She grew up in Chelmsford, England. Her vocabulary, and many of her attitudes are quite Victorian. I think she's charming. She's taught me many things, just by being who she is. And I've learned some hilarious expressions from her as well.

When she is shocked about something, she'll say, "Oh my giddy aunt!" The imagery in that always makes me laugh. If someone feels smugly full of themselves she says of them, "I think someone fancies their lemon drops."

I enjoy the decidedly British usage of her words: she gets cross with people; she carries an invalid pass (handicap tag for her mirror) in her car; the neighbor's cat makes a terrible row. She uses a tea cozy and offers her friends a cuppa. Hearing her speak gives me a sense that I am visiting England.

One day my friend called to tell me that she'd had some water leakage disaster in her apartment. She'd had a plumber come in to repair something major. As he worked on the pipes, he seemed rather depressed and began telling my friend all of his woes.

"A terrible situation he has, with his wife wanting to leave him and having an invalid child. Sad, really." She paused, thinking about his sad tale. "He told me as he was leaving that he felt better after talking with me."

That was so like my friend. She is wonderful at listening and nurturing people.

"So as he was leaving, I told him to keep his pecker up. Life would be getting better for him."

I sucked in a lungful of air. Oh my goodness. "Did you really say that?"

"Yes. But I don't think he thought well of it. He gave me the most unusual look and left in a hurry."

"Well..."

"Barbara, why do you think he would do that?"

A few explanations and howls of laughter later, she got it. And when she got it, she was delighted with the shock quality of her comment, even though telling someone to "keep your pecker up" was common and acceptable back in London during the 30s. Just not now, and not in America.

It reminded me of a family we knew as children. The parents had immigrated from Australia and provided no end of amusement to my mother, for some reason. She was unaccustomed to hearing their accent and it was a matter of comment almost every time we spent time with the family. Our fathers looked alike and served at church together in a similar capacity. (and they both fell asleep sitting up on the rostrum at church, much to our chagrin). Mother was surprised to have the husband kiss her every time he saw her. She was shocked when the wife asked mother once for "...a clean nappy because Andrew has pissed himself again."

The story I recall about the woman in this family is one that always makes me smile. The husband was a scientist in a large, prestigious university. He bought a house for the family close to his work. Because of the proximity, and his warm nature, he invited his colleagues over for lunch one day. He was a vegetarian back in the 60s, when few people were, and his colleagues wanted to see what he ate. So he invited them home.

The day they were to have lunch, they all piled into two cars and drove the few blocks over to his home. Just as they were all getting out of the cars, Elizabeth came trotting into the driveway from the street. She'd been out jogging and had just made it home. "Oh," she exclaimed, "I'm all knocked up!" as she reached out to shake the first man's hand. Her visitor's eyes popped and they all were speechless. Clearly, her comments were not what they had expected.

It can be humiliating to stumble into something like this--as the one speaking--and not know why people fall into silence or gales of laughter. I went to Ireland once for a speaking engagement over 10 days. I became acquainted with a number of wonderful people who helped host the event at which I spoke. In addition to loving Ireland, the manner of speaking and the accent, the people were warm and delightful. One evening, on the way to the conference hall, my driver stopped to pick up Eddie, who was hitch hiking into town to hear me. We chatted and laughed heartily all the way to our destination.

Later, as I was speaking that night, I began to mention individuals by name in the crowd. "And there's Eddie. We gave him a ride tonight on the way here." 300 pair of eyes bulged and looked wonderingly over at Eddie, who was turning a deep shade of red. It was deathly silent. I got back to my topic and stayed there for the rest of the evening.

Later, an older Irish gentleman sidled up to me and explained that the Irish say that they give someone a lift, but never a ride. Giving someone a ride has sexual connotations to it. So I had just announced to this crowd that I had had sex with Eddie in the car on the way over to my talk that night. No wonder he was mortified. I could have collapsed from embarassment.

The rate at which a person can mature is directly proportional to the embarrassment he can tolerate. Douglas Engelbart.