Part of living in the South is understanding when terms of endearment are spoken as an insult and when they are not. When you hear a term of endearment ask yourself two questions:
1. How well does this person know me?
2. Have i just been having a knock down drag out fight with the person speaking the term of endearment?
Ive had the opportunity to work alongside a lot of healthcare personnel from new york and new jersey during my career and ive come to the conclusion that the way we fight in the south is a whole lot more passive aggressive than the way they fight in the north. A new yorker will tell you to go **** yourself while standing 2 inches from your face. A texan will tell you she’s gonna pray for you. It means the same thing.
If in doubt, refer back to the 2 questions i mentioned. If they dont know you well enough to call you a sweet name, its probably not sweet. If you’ve been in an argument or disagreement and they suddenly wish you nothing but good things, understand yall are still arguing…they’re just now speaking a language that you arent fluent in.
If you find yourself in a southern kindness battle you can pretty much respond in one of two ways:
1. Tell them to grow up, pull themselves together, and act like an adult.
2. Smile real big, place your hand flat on your chest with wrist arched high and say, “Well Bless your heart, aren’t you sweet?!”
Fighting in the South can be somewhat entertaining at times. It looks like everyone is just appreciating the heck out of each other until someone chucks a stapler at the other one’s head.
I was laughing the whole time I was reading this. 🙂