Nit picking

My maternal grandma Pearl pulled out of high school in the 9th grade. I'm unclear whether she dropped out, or that her Dad thought 14 year old girls didn't need more education. She was the youngest child of five, the only girl, and her mom passed away during the great influenza epidemic when she was 12 years old, so Gram "took care of the men." She cooked, cleaned, sewed and read a lot.

Why this bit of trivia? I suppose that is because though she never graduated from high school, her love for reading kept her educated and interested in the world. What's more, my fondest memories were our hours-long conversations over tea and toast. You would never find her at a loss for words. We would talk about politics, religion, family, music, television and books. Later in my life the topics for discussion turned more toward relationships and raising children. And our "visits" were never less than an hour long, whether over the phone, in person or by post. (Some family members would complain about that bitterly, too!)

But one thing still strikes me to this day: She would never lean on the crutches of using cheater words such as, "Ya know", "Like", "Basically", "Uh", or swear words of any kind. A good Methodist girl, she followed the commandments of "thou shalt not take the Lord's name in vain" and took it to the next level. Swear words were for the simple-minded who couldn't think of anything meaningful to say.

She and I would grouse about our pet peeves. Hers was often Internet related. She would say, "It really bugs me when these announcers on TV will say 'double u, double u, double u dot'..."And she would enunciate each syllable clearly and emphatically. It makes me smile to this day when I hear someone say it.

Hey grandma, how about this one. "The people? Who are always ending each sentence fragment? With a question in their voices?"as if to constantly reassure themselves that you are hanging on their every word by asking for your approving nod. My nine year old does this, and I know that's how the other kids speak in class. But maybe I am so distracted with my thoughts I'm not keying in to what she says.

Now it gets more difficult for me to overlook people who use the word "basically" or "like" in at least every paragraph. Come folks. Truly, everything can not really be like everything else. Like, ya know?

And in conversation that is mostly conjecture why use the word "basically"? It's got to be a warning that when I looked up "basic" in the American Heritage Dictionary it used "base" in every sentence to describe it. "--n. Something that is basic. As in ba'si.cal.ly" Thanks for the clarification! If I hear one more person who uses "basically" in their conversation and then go on for another 10 minutes, I'm gonna strangle them!

I miss you Gram. I hope you and St. Peter have good conversations! You would have been a great blogger!