Please Repeat That

I don’t care what they say, we Michiganders do not have an accent.

But other regions sure do.

When I moved to Florida, my first job was at the Winn Dixie grocery store as cashier. I’d spent my entire working career in offices as a secretary, so appreciated the training. My partner was a friendly girl from North Carolina.

I couldn’t understand a word she said.

Now, I have the kind of mind that spells words I hear. This happens lickety-split, and I’m rarely aware of it unless my brain chooses the wrong spelling, when the sentence momentarily makes no sense.

I noticed it when conversing with Miss North Carolina. Her accent was so strong, I was several words behind in conversation as my brain tried to translate.

Didn’t go well. I gave up asking her to repeat and I’m certain she thought I was dim-witted.

Six months into the job, I accepted an office position at a nearby elementary school, but had a few verbal adventures before I left.

Tried to assist a lady one afternoon who asked me about the flower sale. I told her that mums were on sale. She stared at me as if I’d spoken Martian. I tried again. She asked again. We stared at each other again. Finally, the bagger sighed and handed her a sales flyer.

But the most embarrassing and humorous incident came behind the customer service desk. An elderly man shuffled up to the counter and mumbled something about “gold.” He waved a shaky hand at the chewing tobacco shelves, so I tried to identify anything with gold on the label.

No good. Too many choices. I turned back and asked again. He babbled and tried to point, but his finger wobbled. The line behind him grew.

I tried. I pointed to various choices. I started at one end and moved my hand. His mumbling grew more frustrated as he waved his arm around. By this point, I was mortified. Shoppers waiting started offering suggestions which didn’t help, since I was unfamiliar with chewing tobacco.

Finally, one man called out the brand wanted.

“He always gets the same one,” he explained.

My customers were too polite to laugh. At least, then.

Gophers to a Michigander are mammals. In Central Florida, they’re tortoises. And you can imagine my shock the first time I saw a sign advertising Pressed Cubans.

We won’t even start with British crackers or chips, or gardens, which means yard, and not the flower beds I imagined surrounding every house there.

Sometimes it’s a generation thing. My parents called refrigerators “ice boxes,” since their parents and grandparents actually had boxes that held ice and straw to keep items cold. My children blinked at me whenever I asked them to go to the ice box.

Or dial a number for me.

Or answer that we’d leave at quarter to.

My friend in Boston had a “cah-penter” husband, and bought a new “cah.”

It was common in Pontiac for someone to “axe you if you wanted to go,” though I learned that from the year 1000 through the Elizabethan age, “axe” in England meant to question, and the expression emigrated to the U.S.

I have a friend who’s always “fixin’” to do something, and when I once teased about repairs, she frowned, confused.

Michigan accent? We sound like Hollywood actors, while some announcers at the Weather Channel, in Atlanta, betray their Georgia accent.

Once, in California, though, someone guessed I was from the Midwest because of my accent.

Accent? Me?

Language is a fascinating study, from locations to time periods. My great-grandmother would “tote a poke” to the store, and had to translate for me as a child.

Houses in my neighborhood had couches, divans, davenports, or sofas—take your pick.

I won’t even start on slang since I’m generations away from communicating with my teenaged grandchildren.

Pollywogs or tadpoles? Fireflies or lightning bugs?

The English language has its own Tower of Babel.