The Tip of the Tongue, The Teeth, The Lips

Many of the choir directors I worked under had us do enunciation exercises.

We'd also sing the alphabet in fancy ways, too.

Anyway, I am no stranger to being taught to pronounce things clearly and distinctly. 

But I've lived in Utah for all of my adult life, and I've let things slip. 

I say "moun-in." 

"Buh-in."

I don't say "Hurrakin," mostly because I'm not that hickish (yet). It will be "Hurricane" forever. 

I don't feel like dropping my Ts is some kind of travesty, but merely an adaptation to local dialect. 

Jeremy takes it personally, however, and is trying to squelch it out in our children. 

I find this strange, since he can't spell, and is constantly asking me to rattle off long words for him so he can write them down correctly. He's no grammar Nazi. That's me (or rather, That is I...or...I don't know....). He's turned into the Enunciation Enforcer.

(No disrespect towards my husband. I can't do calculus and he can. I'm merely pointing out the differences.)

I give him a hard time about this, since I don't see it as a fault in learning. It's just a local adaptation of words, and I see nothing wrong with it. 

He's very offended by it. 

So, it was with no small amount of glee that I witnessed Jeremy stumble over his own tongue a few days ago.

We were lying in bed getting ready to go to sleep, and Jeremy was looking up at the bookshelf above our bed (another source of anxiety in his life). 

"Dara," he said very seriously. "I really don't like having all those books above our bed. One good earthquake, and they'll fall and kill us."

I laughed heartily, and tried to reassure him that he would be fine, and they would probably just fall on our bodies, and not our heads. 

He looked at me skeptically, and proceeded to say that under no circumstances would we have a bookshelf above our bed when we move into a new place. I shrugged noncommittally, and he shot me a cranky face. 

"I don't mind the pic'ures above our bed..."

"What did you just say??? Did you just say 'Pic'Ures'?"

I didn't hear his reply since I was laughing to hard.

"Pic'Ures!" I mocked, and then doubled over again in bed laughing.

"Anyway," he rolled his eyes. "I don't mind the PICTURES..."

And then my brain started thinking about how illogical that sounded since the pictures had glass and I could see them doing more damage than a book....

Jeremy's solution was plexi-glass.

Pic'ures. 

Pic'ures with Plexi-glass.  

Oh, Jeremy...