Man-speak

 Man speak

     We never thought about this form of communication as it seemed organic in our speech toward one another. Good friend Lucinda put a name on this style of talking that Greg and I used in describing events or people who passed through our fortunate lives. Man-speak is a stilted square form of lingo using  formal words or odd pronunciations that makes everything rather stiff but silly. Thus a hot dog is a "frankfurter sandwich" and "a UCLA game" would be "football match." If a man were fat, we would temper the description by saying he was a large man. Whiskey was the "brown liquid" and a dinner invitation might be called " supper at our home." More than the actual words and phrases was the way the sentences were pronounced in a voice that was part Paul Harvey and part really square fellas we had run into in our youth. A recording of South Gate councilman Don Sawyer awkwardly reading the history of the Rancho San Antonio and then Tweedy Ranch where a south gate was in the place where the Tweedy Mile now exists was an inspiration. A car was always an automobile, kids were children and boobs were always bosoms. As far as women's garments went a bra was a brassiere which is respectful and hilarious since no one calls a bra a brassiere anymore. Greg liked to called the South Gate pool the Natatorium since it was described as such on a Chamber of Commerce publication. A tie was a necktie, a fork an entrenching tool and a common beer would be "an iced cold bohemia-style beer" that might be enjoyed while feeling "a heavenly breeze." Man speak would never use slang, instead it would use as many words as possible to describe  something that could be expressed in  a grunt. Part of this linguistic fun was also the intentional mispronunciation of words so that a  pom-pom would find the stress on the last pom instead of making them even. Inspired by my father a dish in a Mexican restaurant was always sounded out as a "Chile Reh-lenno" and a certain day of the week was "Wangsday." Pedantry was encouraged so Bach would be said with a kind of gag at the final ch and despite his ire at Robert Siegel we said "poyem" to describe that form of literature. This was a form of delightful communication only we enjoyed except when cousin Kent visited and then three men men spoke. I am proud to say young Ed picked up on the style and knows his way around a man sentence or two.