Where Have all the Adverbs Gone?

Where have all the adverbs gone? ( Can you sing that to the tune of Pete Seeger's folk hit of the 60's, "Where have all the Flowers Gone?"  That's what I hear in my head...).

I had to write today about a trend that just REALLY gets me on my soap box: Language.

I wanted to share a funny picture on my Facebook page, but upon seeing the first couple of comments, I felt like I would be posting “a rated R movie” for all my friends to see.  The picture was fine – cute, even.  The people commenting also enjoyed it, but their comments of appreciation made my color-treated hair bristle!

Just not my thing.

I once took my daughter, then about age 9, to IHOP one evening for some fun "Mommy and Me" time.  As we sat in our booth, I could EASILY hear the teenagers on the other side of the low partition cussing up a storm.  After hearing the colorful words they chose to substitute for actual intelligent sounding words and knowing that if I could hear every word, my daughter could to, I finally had had it.

I stood up in my booth, leaned across my daughter and popped my head up over the side of the "pancake meal dividers" and gave a little smile to the 4 young adults sitting looking up at me in surprise.  "Could you guys please ease up on the language?  I have my kid with me."

Hearing a muttering or two of "I'm sorry" and "I told you," from one of the kids to the other, I retreated back down to sit beside my sweet girl and continue our fun time together.  One of the young men slipped up again, and I did hear one of his friends chastise him - probably a play for my ears, but it was something.

Now, if we were in the same situation today and I handled it the same way, either my teen or pre-teen daughter would probably recoil in embarrassment and melt into her pancakes even further than the ball of butter.  BUT - I felt a sense of "mother bear pride" that I believe was natural. We are not called only to protect our children from fire and famine, but from anything that hinders or affects their growth as a mature, intelligent individual and for me - as a child of God growing in her faith. 

So WHY has our culture grown so desensitized to the "potty mouth" words of yesterday? Why are words that used to shock us being so widely used and are so MUCH less shocking?

I am reminded of a line from one of my favorite Christmas movies, A Christmas Story:

"Oh Fudge."  "Only I didn't say fudge. I said the word, the big one, the queen-mother of dirty words, the F dash dash dash word."   -Young and Adult Ralphie  (A Christmas Story, 1983*)

How is it that a word that in 1983 (and yes, I know it takes place 40 years earlier!) could be written into a movie as the "queen mother of dirty words" and is now something I hear in the grocery store?!   Why are people giving up creative and intelligent sounding vocabulary and substituting it with a menial few words that made our grandmothers’ hair turn even whiter?!

In an effort to help out my fellow man, therefore, I'd like to suggest some adverbs that seem to be slowly seeping from our daily language that could REPLACE these more shocking words. “ Bring ‘em back,” she says!!!   Adjectives and nouns are also a big problem, but I’m a big fan of the adverb, so I am choosing to focus on those for now.  Please accept this verbage selection guide as a tool to assist anyone out there who grew up with an old man like Ralphie's and you just can't seem to get it out of your head!

When something is really wonderful, you like it immensely and want to communicate your happy feelings for it, try these words:

* Wow!  That's "AMAZINGLY AWESOME!"

* Dude.  So "INCREDIBLY RIGHTEOUS."  (a little “Bill & Ted” shout out)

* Geewhilikers!  She is "EXCEEDINGLY LOVELY!"

Ok, that last one is a little too “Wally and Beaver,” but let’s not discount those lonely words that are gradually being ignored and shut away, only to be replaced by the “bad boys” of the linguistic world - one's that I would blush if I was typing on here.  ;-)

Look what thesaurus.com* lists:  (Note:  For those not aware, a ‘thesaurus’ is something that can give you substitute words to make you sound smarter.  I use it all the time. {secret reveal!} )

absolutely, acutely, amply, astonishingly, awfully, certainly, considerably, dearly, decidedly, deeply, eminently, emphatically, exaggeratedly, exceedingly, excessively, extensively, extraordinarily, extremely, greatly, highly, incredibly, indispensably, largely, notably, noticeably, particularly, positively, powerfully, pressingly, pretty, prodigiously,profoundly, remarkably, substantially, superlatively,surpassingly, surprisingly, terribly,truly, uncommonly, unusually,vastly, wonderfully

How much more intelligent would a person sound saying that something is "prodigiously awesome" or "pressingly powerful" than the much less intelligent sounding substitute?

And what about the negative?  What about the temptation that grows upon stubbing one’s toe, the temptation to share a negative to which poor Ralphie succumbed?

I have an answer for that, too!  As the blog name suggests, I am a bit quirky, therefore I have my OWN words that I use when a sudden occurrence causes great pain, frustration or even joy.  Behold AMY’S thesaurus:

·   * Piddle – this is sort of my “level one” word for when I mess up.  “Oh, piddle” is the most common variation, which I believe I learned from my grandmother.

·   * Pootiehead – this is my name for when a fellow driver cuts me off or my fellow man or woman moves their grocery cart to the newly opening line – even though I was in FRONT of them for 10 minutes beforehand! 

And finally….MY “queen word.”  This word comes out when I find that last Lego with my bare foot while kissing my daughter goodnight.  I “let it fly” when I am shocked and surprised to find that the new red shorts got into the washer with the whites and we now have pinks.  I even said it once in anger at my daughter when I discovered her school project had been delayed until – ahem – the last night. 

Yes folks, I use this word for extreme frustration, elation and even anger.

That word is a name.  And that name is....

·     * SACAGAWEA!

I hope that this incredible daughter of a Shoshone chief who once guided Lewis and Clark on their great expedition would be honored that I have chosen her name to…well…shout in frustration.  It has such a great ring to it – and I REALLY NEED FIVE SYLLABLES to truly get out my feelings.

Thank you for having a "prodigiously awesome" name, Sacagawea, so that I can have a cool and kid-friendly interjection and still teach my kids about history when they ask me what I just said!

  

NOW – I do need to state what is, to me, the obvious.  I am not perfect.  I have PLENTY of things to work on in my life.  I am not BETTER than anyone else – just have different things to work on.  And to tell the truth, shouting Sacagawea’s name or calling someone a "pootiehead" under my breath is still losing my temper and is something for me to work on, even if it doesn’t get me shunned by the PTA.

I won’t go into my own personal offenses, faults, sins and other nouns for the areas of my life that need work.  Just know that I have plenty and my little humorous diatribe is an attempt to point out what I feel is a sad trend in society, but NOT to lift myself above it all.

I just wanted to provide a few NEW little words for the world, offer my thoughts on the developing  “pootiehead-esque”  language of many Americans, and as always on this blog….

….provide food for thought.

Gotta go now, because – SACAGAWEA!!!   I am hungry for lunch.

@

* Resources used:

www.thesaurus.com

www.biography.com

www.IMDB.com

copyright 2013

To use quotes from this blog,

 please contact author for permission.