Rare, Collectible, & Otherwise

Category: About (Page 13 of 21)

It’s about books

Life in a Cold Sack…

Labor Day is behind us (don’t slam on the brakes, it’s tailgating). The holiday generally marks the end of the boating season, the camping season, the grilling season, and – at long last – the NBA season. (Oh wait, the women are still playing…)

Back in the day, the Labor Day weekend was the last chance to get away with the kids before the school year started. These days, students are about ready for Christmas break by the time Labor Day finally arrives. The school year starts much earlier. Kids are much smarter as a result – but I don’t need to tell you that. (They probably already have!)

I was pretty smart before I had kids, but shed intelligence like a dandered cat as they grew. I knew enough, though, to live in a cold sack. Didn’t realize that was where we were until I overheard my daughter telling someone that we could play in the street because our house was in a cold sack. Thinking about it. Thinking. Thinking.

Ah. Cul-de-sac… who knew my daughter could speak French at such a young age?

She wasn’t far off, actually. It translates as bottom of the bag, which is where you find all the unpopped kernals of corn, the ones we called the grandma’s (although I don’t know why. Even though I am now a grandpa, those bag-dregs don’t look any more attractive…)

And better bottom of the bag than bottom of the barrel, which is a whole different kettle of fish.

Some Sacks from a different bag: Oliver Sacks, neurologist and bestselling author.

Do you Chuckle?

Maybe my excellent English teacher Mrs. McNutt is to blame. Somewhere, I developed a curiosity about the language and where words and phrases came from – things like “he’s full of baloney.” (I believe that one began as “full of blarney,” from the auld Irish and the Blarney Stone…)

Some of the sayings have fallen into disuse, or repeated only by grandparents (like me). I haven’t heard “not worth a Continental” in awhile. (The early “Continental” dollar bill was notoriously avoided by colonists during the Revolutionary War period.) I do hear people being called a “smart aleck,” and I can only assume that the person doing the calling has no idea who “Aleck” was. (1840’s New York City, Aleck Hoag, a sort of grifter who thought he knew more than the police, who later arrested him.)

But – if it makes you chuckle, you may be showing your rural roots. Where does the chuckle come from? (Other than a less-than-knee-slappingly-funny joke?) It was originally a verb form, as in “to chuck,” (not to be confused with the verb “upchuck” which really bad jokes may inspire). Around here, we would be more likely to say, “to cluck” than “chuck” – like a chicken. Back in medieval times, the chuck-chuck-chuckle was raucous laughter akin to the sound from the henhouse. By the 1800’s it had evolved into the sound of suppressed laughter, perhaps to keep from disturbing the chickens.

Sort of like a giggle, which – as we all know – is a baby Google.

Try this for chuckles:

Comfort Memory

I love walking into the big supermarket. Especially early in my day. The first taste of grocery air makes me breathe deep and slow – and I recall my apron-wearing days. I have to enjoy the aroma at first-entry since my nose seems to acclimate to it just a few steps beyond the door. (I’d close my eyes and let it take me back if there was no risk of running into the canned spinach display.)

The smell in the grocery stores must be a hard-wired connection to my youth. First job. My mentor Marshall Allen. He was the always-laughing businessman who could not walk by an employee without saying “Hustle!” I both loved and dreaded it. I think I worked as hard and fast as a naive teenager could.

The aroma of the supermarket reminds me of him, and home, and simpler times.

I wish it came in an aerosol so I could spray a little around throughout the day.

Try this for that Comfort Feeling – as associated by the tastebuds!

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