Posted in Uncategorized

My Mom’s Momisms, Euphemisms, and Early Thelmisms (part 1)…

My mom was a nurse — because her stepmother believed that women should be teachers or nurses, and my aunt was already a teacher.
My mom had some stories about her experiences working in the hospital. One involved an older male patient who kept getting out of bed. Nurses, back in the day, were taught to give directives with a gentle “we”, rather than an accusatory “you”. When she took the gentleman’s arm and said, “Let’s get back in bed,” the man snapped, “I did not come here to be insulted by you or anybody else!”
Another favorite from the nursing realm involved a story from her nurses’ training. The nursing students were preparing to go to a formal dance. One of mom’s friends, who was rather sparsely endowed, was wearing a strapless formal that had a newfangled contraption inside the bra section of the dress that inflated with a little air valve to, say, give the girl’s figure a more enhanced appearance. When her date arrived and attempted to pin her corsage to her dress — boom!! Humor for some, humiliation for someone else.

Posted in Word of the Day....Thelmese Fictionary

cattywampus

Microsoft search yields: “Cattywampus is a curious colloquial American word doubling as meaning “diagonal” and “askew”. The etymology is a mongrel. The “diagonal” bit may have been influenced by catty-corner, and wampus could have been southern slang for “flail”, but then there’s a fictional creature called the wampus cat and another called catamount.”

Cattywampus could, if we aren’t careful, result in a category [see Word of the Day from February 11, 2020…..]

Posted in Poems and Songs (mine and more....)

Violets of Dawn…

[song by Eric Anderson]

Take me to the night I’m tipping
Topsy turvy turning upside down.
Hold me close and whisper what you will
For there is no-one else around.
Oh, you can sing-song me sweet smiles
Regardless of the city’s careless frown.
Come watch the no colors fade, blazing
Into petaled sprays of violets of dawn.

In blindful wonderments enchantments
You can lift my wings softly to flight.
Your eyes are like swift fingers
Reaching out into the pockets of my night.
Oh, whirling twirling puppy-warm
Before the flashing cloaks of darkness gone.
Come see the no colors fade, blazing
Into petaled sprays of violets of dawn.

Some Prince Charming I’d be on two white steeds
To bring you dappled, diamond crowns
And climb your tower, Sleeping Beauty,
‘Fore you even know I’ve left the ground.
Oh, you can wear a Cinderella, Snow White,
Alice Wonderlanded gown.
Come see the no colors face, blazing
Into petaled sprays of violets of dawn.

But if I seem to wander off in dream-like looks
Please let me settle slowly.
It’s only me just starin’ out at you,
A seeming stranger speaking holy.
No, I don’t mean to wake you up,
It’s only loneliness just coming on.
So let the no colors fade, blazing
Into petaled sprays of violets of dawn.

Like shadows bursting into mist
Behind the echoes of this nonsense song
It’s just the chasing, whispering trails
Of secret steps, oh see them laughing on.
There’s magic in the sleepiness
Of waking to a childish sounding yawn.
Come see the no colors fade, blazing
Into petaled sprays of violets of dawn.