I had forgotten what a good punster you are. In my dictionary creek and crocodile are only a page apart. Isn't that astounding. Anyway, I looked up creek and krik is an "authorized" pronunciation (and might be the earlier one). (Hard to tell the way they wrote it up.)
The thing that surprises me is how these things creep or crip into our personal language. My personal language, it would be. (Don't tell my mother.) (She was an English teacher from California ~ and strict.) (And would be disgusted.) ( And they don't care if you show them it's in the dictionary; they're teaching you to speak Californian, which supercedes any idiocies the rest of the country might succumb to.)
I thought for sure, when I was oh 15, that crik was a sort of joke, like from Deliverance, and that no one outside Appleacheeyuh would say that.
I would maybe even laugh when I heard it.
Then I moved to Oregon, despite perceptions a very sophisticated place, and then to a small town, on a crik. I can't think of another single thing they say "rong", 'round these parts, but half of them, half exactly, say crik.
And I HAVE EVEN SAID IT MYSELF.
OH THE TERROR.
Insidious.
If you've never said it, fellow Mericans, except in mockery, try it ~ just go ahead and say it, in a room by yourself, when there's no one else home, or in the yard ~ and you will feel how shocking it is. It's like noticing green in your skin tone.
USE IT IN A SENTENCE. "Down by the crik."
Now pretend you DIDN'T NOTICE IT UNTIL IT CAME OUT.
You'll be afraid to come out of that room for DAYS. |
