THE WONDERFULLNESS OF MISSPEAKING

BY DAN MILLER
August 15, 2006

I've recently heard two good words that aren't really words, but maybe they should be.

One brought back memories.... the other brought a chuckle.

On the radio I heard Jerry Lee Lewis singing his surprisingly beautiful version of "Over The Rainbow", the old Judy Garland classic.

There's a line in the song:
"Where troubles melt like lemon drops,
Away above the chimney tops,
That's where you'll find me."

But Jerry Lee sings, "Away above the CHIMLEY tops."
And it hit me..... that's exactly the word I used for "chimney" my entire childhood...... chimley!
I think it's a deep south thing.
Imagine my surprise when a friend told me the word is "chimney" not "chimley".
I thought he was kidding, so I looked it up.
To this day, I have to be careful not to use the "L" instead of the "N".

Last night at dinner, my wife and I were busy discussing some grown-up topic when McKensie, our 7 year old, pointed out that she was not being "concluded" in our conversation.
She's a cute kid who likes to be concluded.
We didn't correct her.... instead, we came up with a topic in which we could conclude her.

And, by the way, if you ask McKensie about her favorite dishes, she'll quickly tell you that one of them is "puh-skettie".
We try to order it in restaurants a lot, just because we love to hear her ask for it.
"I'll take puh-skettie please, with parmazzon on the side!"

And if you should happen to interrupt her in the middle of play, she might ask that you not "intersturb" her.
You know, that's a wonderful blending of "disturb" and "interrupt" that I think the folks at Merriam-Webster should actually consider as a new, real word.

Oh, here's one of my particular favorites from several years ago.
McKensie has a little friend named Baker.
I guess kids --like adults -- use visual association to remember things.
All of a sudden, out of the blue, she started calling him Cooker.
We thought Cooker might be a new friend.... then realized it was Baker she was talking about.
And -- believe it or not -- Cooker, err Baker, would answer her, and not even correct her.

Now that she's starting second grade, McKensie has actually adjusted most of her childhood misspeaking, so we don't bother to point out the precious few that remain.

I'm sure the experts might say it's important to correct a child when they misspeak, or confuse words.
But I don't think so.
Just let it go for a while.
No need to intersturb them.
They grow up soon enough, and they'll study all this stuff, concluding grammar and spelling.

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