I’m not sure how to spell this expression, but I’ve heard women say it all my life.  Men use it on occasion, but generally default to “I swear!”, which I suppose in the genteel South seemed a bit harsh for women to say.  Both phrases mean the same thing — some combination of amazement or disgust or frustration — as in, “I swannee, I don’t know what I’m gonna do with that boy!  I can’t think of enough things to tell him not to do!”   Very rarely one would hear, ” I swannee to God,” which would indicate that the phrase’s origin was in an oath of some kind.

A marvelous website (www.word-detective.com) provides a perfectly plausible answer to the very reasonable question of where this odd but often-heard phrase came from.  It seems that in old England, folks said “I shall warrant you,” instead of “I swear;” both being said in the more traditional sense of swearing to tell the whole truth.  In the north of England, the dialectic pronunciation of the phrase “I shall warrant you” was something like “I s’wan ye,”  which goes a long way toward clarifying where this funny old phrase comes from.

I swannee, it’s amazing what one can find on the internet, isn’t it?

I heard a parishioner after church yesterday saying to another, “Bless your biggol heart.”  Hearing that warmed mine, for there are two good Southernisms in a single phrase. 

First is “Bless your heart,”  which is used as an expression of empathy or sympathy, and which I believe is distinctly Southern.  If you doubt me, ask yourself a simple question: can you imagine somebody from Brooklyn, Los Angeles, or Peoria saying it? 

The other is that wonderfully descriptive adjective, “biggol.”  Something may be humongous, huge, large, or merely ample; but sometimes in speech those don’t quite impart the right degree of emphasis.  “Biggol” will usually do the trick in such cases.  We might write, “Stone Mountain is the largest piece of exposed granite in the world,” but that would sound rather stuffy if spoken.  We’d be more liable to say, “That’s a biggol rock right there.”

The moral of this story is to keep on blessing hearts.  You’ll have a biggol reward for it someday.

Southerners are a very “cousiny” people — we seem to have more kinfolks than anybody on earth.  We don’t, really; it’s just that we tend to stay put for generations at a time, so descendants of our great-great-great-great grandparents’ siblings might still be close friends in the community.  We call such cousins “Kissin’ cousins,” because they are so distantly related it’s not considered a problem to date or even marry one of them if we both so choose.

The word “cousin” is always pronounced exactly as it is written — something along the lines of “cuzzin.”  The only exception is when the word is used as an address.  For example, my grandma’s first cousin may be someone whom I need to call by name.  She’s way too old for me to address her by her first name only — that would be disrespectful.  Because she’s not my aunt, and because saying “Mrs.” or “Miss” would be awkward because she’s kinfolks, Southerners (middle Georgians, anyway) long ago came up with “Cudn,” which is what we use in such situations.  “Cudn Frances, it’s wonderful to see you!”  “Cudn Paul still plays golf several times a week at age 92.”  It’s never used except as an address, always coupled with the cousin in question’s first name — I wouldn’t say, “I’m going to see my cudn;” for “cousin” is the proper usage there; but I might say, “I’m going to see Cudn Eleanor.”  That, in a nutshell, is the distinction.

Cudn.  It’s a wonderful form of address; distinctly Southern, eminently respecful, but unfortunately, disappearing rapidly in today’s homogenized South.

Aunts are wonderful people to have in one’s life.  Depending on whom one is talking to, though, pronunciation of the word can vary greatly.  So far as I know, the three most common pronunciations are “ant,” “ont,” and “aint.”  

I was raised using the first and the last of those pronunciations — the first, if I was talking about my aunt; the second, if I was talking to her.  “You need to meet my “ant” Helen,” I might tell someone.  When I introduce the two, I would say, “Aint Helen, this is my friend _____.”   Don’t ask me why — that’s just how most native people of good standing used the pronunciations in Fayette County, Georgia during my youth, and yet today. 

In my experience, “aint”  is used as the only pronunciation of the word in upland regions of the state.  There, you may hear, “I need to talk to my aint about it.”  That sounds substandard to my own ear, but it’s perfectly acceptable in many places.  Standard pronunciation, after all, in many cases depends solely on where you’re from.

As for “ont,” I really couldn’t say.  Growing up, we thought it was solely an African-American pronunciation, but I’ve learned since that many Northerners say it that way, too.  Furthermore, I’m relatively certain that’s the orginal British pronunciation.  So, while “ont” may be the most correct pronunciation to most English-speaking people,  I personally never will be convinced that the usage I grew up with isn’t the highest and best.  If you don’t believe me, just ask Aint Helen, my favorite aunt.

My late aunt used to describe a general malaise — not quite sick, but not exactly well — as the “epizootic.”  This she pronounced just as it looks — “ep-uh-ZOO-dic” — rather than the more correct “ep-uh-zuh-WAT-ic.”  The word really means a disease that affects many different animals of the same species at the time, a sort of critter epidemic, but Auntie used it to describe what we today would call the “blahs.”  When she thought one of us had the epizootic, she’d recommend we be shot in the tail with hot fat, presumable to perk us up.  I’ve heard this saying in other families as well, and am curious as to how widespread its usage may have once been.  Now, everyone seems content to get the blahs from time to time, but they seemed a lot more interesting when they were called the epizootic, and Auntie was threatening a shot in the tail with hot grease.