Betsy McGee Forester Day--The New Word

A New Word

 

That evening while walking home from the drugstore with two new tablets for printing practice, Betsy thought about a way to talk to her mother about words.  Maggie had a Word-a-Day calendar, and got a word a day on her cell-phone. 

“Mama,” she said, skipping along to keep pace with her mother’s longer strides, “what was your word today?”

“Oh, honey, I didn’t check.  I was so busy trying to meet a deadline.”

“Well, do you have your phone with you?”

“Yes.”

“So you can find out now what the word for today is.”

“OK.  Let’s see. . . “  The app was very fast.  “Oh, swee’pea, I don’t think you will find it very interesting.  It’s a really long one and people don’t use it very often.”

“Well, just say it and I’ll see.”

“OK . . .  ante  de  luv ee an.  Antedeluvian.”

“Let me try!  Aunty de lu . . . what?”

“Vian.  Antedelu-vian.”

“Auntie de luvian.  Right?”

“Oh, honey, that’s right!  That’s a long long word for a little girl.”

“I’m almost four,” she reminded her.

“Yes, but that’s still a little girl to use such a big word.”

“Well, what’s it mean?”

“It means a long time ago.”

“Why don’t people just say, ‘a long time ago?’”  Betsy said.  And what does ‘a long time ago’ have to do with aunts?”

Mama looked perplexed.  It doesn’t have anything to do with . . .  oh, I see.  This isn’t an Auntie like Auntie Hazel or antey like . . . little ants.  It’s a word by itself that means ‘before.’”

“Before?  Before what?”

“Before . . . the flood.”

“Which flood?  The one in Iowa?”  (Betsy didn’t know where Iowa was, but she heard about the bad flood they had on the news.  She had worried about it but her Daddy had said not to worry.  That Iowa was hundreds of miles away.  She didn’t know how far that was but Daddy made it sound really far.)

“No, not that one.”

“Why, not?”

“Well, that wasn’t a long long time ago.”

“What is a long long time ago mean, ‘zackly?”

“It depends on your point of view, I guess.”  Mama saw that Betsy didn’t understand what she meant.  “When I was your age on Monday I thought last week was a long time ago and that Christmas was a long loooooong time ago.  Now . . . a long time ago was the time before you were born and a long long time ago is when I was a little girl your age.”

“So the long long time ago flood happened when you were a little girl?”

“No . . . “  Mama was tired and it had been a long day and sometimes Betsy had more questions than she had answers but, she was proud of the fact that Betsy was so curious and no matter how tired she was she tried to be patient.  Betsy could see it was one of those times even without blinking.  “Remember when you came home from preschool with the picture of Noah’s ark?”

“Sure!  It was one of my favorites.  Even if Petey made fun of my purple giraffe.”

“Well, you know that ark is another word for a big boat.”

“Sure.  Miss Ebberling told us the whole story.   How it rained for a long time and Mr. Noah made a big boat to save his family and a lot of animals.”

“A word for ‘rained a long time’ is flood and another word for flood is deluge . . . “

“Dell yudj?”

“That’s right!  And deluvian comes from another language and it means deluge.  ‘Ante’ comes from the same language—Latin.  So, ante-deluvian means before the flood.’”  Sometimes Mother gave Betsy such a complicated explanation that it finally stopped her questions.  The reason was that Betsy finally had enough information for her next little ‘think.’”  And she started to do it while Mama thought about the illustration on her drafting board so they were both quiet but pleasantly occupied for the rest of the way home.

As soon as she got home she hurried to brush her teeth and wash her hands and face and put on her jammies.  It was very late—Daddy said almost 9:00 o’clock.  Betsy knew that was after her bedtime.  She’d have to think about the clock soon.  Her father had given her a choice between a bath (he was the Bath Master) or a short story.  Guess which she chose.

Once they were both tucked neatly in the big reading chair Daddy picked up the fairy tales book she had gotten for Christmas.  It had many stories, some long, some short.  All pretty good.

“Here we go,”  said Daddy.  “A long long time ago there was a little girl who . . .”

“Oh!  You mean in ante-deluvian time!”

“Antedeluvian?”

“That means ‘before the flood’, Daddy.”

“Really?  Good to know.  Mama been sharing her word a day with you?”

“Yes.”

“Thought so.  O.K., here we go.  An anteluvian time ago there was a little girl who lived in the forest with her mother. . .”

And it was a good story but Betsy was asleep even before Daddy turned the page.