6 Comments
User's avatar
John Jeansonne's avatar

I think your time at Mizzou straightened out your accent. Gave you that Fly-Over-Country eloquence.

Thanks for reading.

By the way, when I was in Seoul for the '88 Olympics and tried out a couple of Korean words to be polite, I was told at one point by an Olympic volunteer that I had a "good Korean accent." Likely story.

John Jeansonne's avatar

George.

Thanks for reading.

Your thoughts remind me of the Kurt Vonnegut line that travels "are dancing lessons from God."

When I was in Seoul for the Olympics, I tried to be polite by picking up a handful of Korean words, and at one point--this is astounding, and I'm not sure how true it was--I was told by a Korean volunteer worker that I had "a good Korean accent." Hah. Well, I tried.

John Jeansonne's avatar

Hey, thanks for reading. Hope you had a fabolous Christmas season. We did, both in the N.Y. snow and on our visit to London.

Fred Bruning's avatar

I am from Brooklyn and went to college in Denver and then Missouri. Once on a "woodsie" in Wyoming, I spent the night entertaining others. "Say dog," the crowd insisted. "Dawg," I replied. "Car," they pleaded. "Cah," I answered. Somehow, I've lost a lot of the Brooklyn accent -- where did it go? -- but not the Brooklyn identity. Still home, still the best, still the only place for pizza. Thanks, John

Melanie Torbett's avatar

Enjoyed this piece, John.

George Vecsey's avatar

John, nice article, since I met you decades ago, you may have had a non-New York accent but you also spoke quickly , fitting in with all the classic NYers in our swarm.

Then again, we journalists travel so much that we become pack rats of words.

I can hear a coal miner friend from SW Virginia saying "poo-er" and I can hear Mickey Mantle turnig the word "red" into "ray-ed" and after living in "Lou-uh-vul"for two years,I have long since adapted "you-all" for plural. Wimbledon induced "boot" for car trunk and "lift" for elevator ...and the odd Spanish or French Italian word that just sounds right for the occasion.

It's a bonus for moving around, or travelling.

In broadest terms, you have become a Long Islander.

GV