Mine was mispronuncing words instead of saying SERVIETTE I use to say SERBIT instead...it use to amuse all my family.
I remember when I was just learning to speak and called my dad a 'Bast*rd' when I tried to say 'Best dad'. Also, to teach me the phrase 'Faux Pas' my parents told me, at first, to say 'Fox pass' which became my favorite phrases for a while. "That's a Fox Pass!" I would shout when someone had cheated in a game. I also fondly remember running around farmer fields with my friends when I was really young. I've lived in small villages for most of my life and now that I live in a city, I miss the countryside.
it ain't easy to reach back in the memory banks 7 decades!... just a few: the satisfying clickety-clack of my roller skates when i hit a length of slate sidewalk [the cement parts just didn't do it for me]... the smell of fresh bread baking that wafted across the bronx river when the wonderbread factory miles away had the ovens going... catching a sunfish on a piece of string and a safety pin, then letting it go... snow: shoveling it, walking on the path to our house with walls of it higher than my head, sledding down the hill... going to the library on my own at 8-9 years old and lugging home as many books as i could carry... a carousel-on-a-truck that came around to the neighborhoods... good humor and bungalow bar trucks in the summertime [my favorites were a chocolat malted double-stick bungalow bar and orange creamsicles]... summers spent on lake pontoosuc, MA... riding a horse for the first time, our first summer at the lake...
I have never heard it used before. When is it often used? Your memories are amazing!! Do you keep a memory diary?
It's not often used, but it's a when you've crossed the line, so to speak. I come from a very middle class family, so it's a very useful phrase to have.
Indeed..it is interesting to see that uppermiddle class aspire to French words. I would have thought English is posher then French by miles. It is amusing the way you said Fox Pass ...what an original thing to say..haha.
When my dad came home from the railroad. He was section foreman, and he smelled of kreosote and sweat - and it was the most wonderful smell in the world. August, when the phlox started blooming and that's all you could smell around my playhouse (an old chicken coop my dad converted for me). The day my mom put away her sewing (she was a seamstress, working out of our home) and came out and made mud pies with me.
One of my favorite childhood memories is my dad coming home from work and me running up to him and screaming "Daddy!!!" and holding onto his leg while sitting on his foot and him walking around like a giant with me attached.
Too many... Holiday by the Moselle river... one of my first memories travelling to Canada with my dad when I was ten emigrating to New Zealand with my family first night in Nelson, NZ first day of school and getting lots of presents / sweets when my brother and sisters were born summer days or evenings spent outdoors, in the garden... climbing trees, skateboarding, biking, sleeping in hammocks... days spent on the beach any time spent swimming, playing tennis or football with friends Saturday mornings and watching cartoons in bed listening to good music on our deck making 'films' with my brother and sisters the time my dad taught me my first guitar chords birthday parties, especially going to an Acquatic park in Auckland... also, randomly, the day I discovered a love for the band Queen
Learning to sail a boat. I took sailing lessons at my family's cottage on a lake in Ontario, Canada, and it was wonderful. Learning to cut firewood - to use an axe and a chainsaw. Learning to drive a tractor. Learning to play a guitar. Having a friend who knows a thousand songs really helps! Loving a pet. I grew up with cats and big dogs (Newfoundlands) and they were wonderful. Dawn. Learning to love getting up early, when it's still dark, and watching the sky brighten and the sun rise and remind me that no matter what goes on in the big wide world, every day we get to greet the dawn, and for at least a moment, we can believe that everything will be all right.
