Wooligood's Wisdom - Life with a Southern Accent.

Someone once noted that a Southerner can get away with the most awful kind of insult just as long as it's prefaced with the words ``Bless her heart'' or ``Bless his heart.'' As in, ``Bless his heart, if they put his brain on the head of a pin, it'd roll around like a BB on a six-lane highway.'' Or, ``Bless her heart, she's so bucktoothed, she could eat an apple through a picket fence.'' There are also the sneakier ones that I remember from tongue- clucking types of my childhood: ``You know, it's amazing that even though she had that baby seven months after they got married, bless her heart, it weighed 10 pounds!'' As long as the heart is sufficiently blessed, the insult can't be all that bad, at least that's what my Great-Aunt Tiny (bless her heart, she was anything but) used to say. I was thinking about this the other day when a friend was telling me about her new Northern friend who was upset because her toddler is just beginning to talk and he has a Southern accent. My friend, who is very kind and, bless her heart, cannot do a thing about those thighs of hers, so don't even start, was justifiably miffed about this. After all, this woman had CHOSEN to move south a couple of years ago. ``Can you believe it?'' she said to my friend. ``A child of mine is going to be taaaallllkkin' a-liiiike thiiiissss.'' I can think of far worse fates than speaking Southern for this adorable little boy, who, bless his heart, must surely be the East Coast king of mucus. I wish I'd have been there. I would have said that she shouldn't fret, because there is nothing so sweet or pleasing on the ear as a soft Southern drawl. Of course, maybe we shouldn't be surprised at her ``carryings on.'' After all, when you come from a part of the world where ``family silver'' refers to the large medallion around Uncle Vinnie's neck, you just have to, as Aunt Tiny would say, ``consider the source.'' Now don't get me wrong. Some of my dearest friends are from the North, bless their hearts. I welcome their perspective, their friendships and their recipes for authentic Northern Italian food. I've even gotten past their endless complaints that you can't find good bread down here.

excerpted from: MICROWAVIN' GRITS?
You know you was raised better'n that!
by Celia Rivenbark