Reverting to My Roots

Copyrighted by Lorna Tedder. Originally published in Third Degree of Contrast.

On occasion,  I  revert  to  my  roots  and  my  South Georgia accent comes out with a vengeance.  My daughters think it’s hilarious.

Attract Him Back

I’m not sure what triggers it.

The girls tell me that whenever I tell a story from my childhood,  I  start  talking  “Southern”  again.  (Hey!  Y’all don’t be makin’ fun of my raisings or sumpin’!)

Sometimes when I return from a visit to the farm, I’ll hang onto my drawl for a couple of days and the girls fear it won’t go away. (I reckon they were jes’ about as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rockin’ chairs….)

And for some strange(r)  reason, I revert to my roots when I turn protective, especially if I’m suddenly a representative  of  all  the  mothers  in  the  world.  Like  today, when I was dropping Shannon back at her dad’s and two little boys were playing in the edge of the street. Their ball got away from them and rolled right under my car, even though I was doing about .25 miles per hour when it happened and very aware, maternally so, that there were two little boys playing ball in the edge of the street while their dad was goofing around in the garage. I stopped the car and waited for them to retrieve the ball while Oblivious And  Useless  Father  Figure  checked  out  the  edge  of  a brick on his garage door and never looked up and I, of course, could  have squished either boy or grabbed both kids and been half way to  Montana by the time he noticed they were gone or, more likely, by  the  time their mom came out and asked him where the boys were.

As I told Shannon, “I oughtta roll that winder down an’ tell ‘em to tell their daddy he better be payin’ attention to—”

That’s when Shannon started laughing.

Or sumpin’.


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