On This Day in Family History - June 23

I don't have pictures of any of the people on my birthday/anniversary/memorial list for today, so I'm going to do something different. 

I've recently discovered this guy on Instagram who posts videos about Southern things. He is from Laurel, Mississippi. His name is Landon Bryant -- he's actually an art teacher in a magnet school in Laurel. His Instagram account is "landontalks" and he is on Facebook, too, under his own name. But his funny videos are posted on Instagram.

Well, when I listen to his videos I'm transported right back to my childhood and my grandmother -- Cleffie Hicks Burford. She was from Arkansas, and she (and her siblings) used just about every Southern expression Landon has included in his talks. And whichever ones Grandma didn't use, I heard in southern Alabama from my ex-mother-in-law, Topsy Carrigan.

Photo: Cleffie and Casey, November 1982

Photo: Topsy with Christopher and Casey, December 1982

(I didn't realize I had two pictures of them holding my kids sitting right by the same window in our house in Searcy, Arkansas.)

Somewhere in just about every video Landon uses the expression "mama an'em" (and them), which is one of my favorites -- more often heard in Alabama than when I lived in Arkansas. 

Here are some examples -- taken from a couple of his videos:

HOW SOUTHERN FOLKS SAY "TIRED"

wore slap out

have to get better to die

under the doctor

petered out

worn to a frazzle

had to take to the bed

have a spell

sinking spell

puny

peaked (that's two syllables: peak-ed)

dog tired

stove up (tired and sore, or stiff and sore)

petered out

stick a fork in me, I'm done

pooped

give out

plum give out

tuckered out

running on empty

running on fumes and co'cola

tired as all get out

under the weather

feeling poorly

STARTLED EXPRESSIONS

mercy

mercy me

mercy sakes alive

oh my stars

o my stars and garters

dagnabbit

ooh wee

what in the world

for crying out loud

oh forever more

oh my heavens

never in all my days

never in all my born days

I do declare

well I declare

mercy sakes

oh my

dadgummit

what in tarnation

well forevermore

well I never

man alive

if that don't beat all

great day in the morning

oh foot

heavens to betsy

I declare

as I live and breathe

what on gods green earth

man alive

land sakes 

land o' goshen

my lands

great day in the morning

Okay, admit it -- you heard them in Cleffie's voice, didn't you?