As they say at the Vicarage ...
Many, many years ago, when I was a new curate in a different part of the country, my training incumbent had a daughter of 11 or 12, who used to come and play with or look after our two pre-school age children. At that time I had lived a sheltered life and had little experience of daughters of the vicarage. True, I had dated one (the youngest of four sisters) very briefly, before I started going out with Alison. But it was such a busy church and vicarage, that you had to book her up about three months in advance, and I found I hadn't the patience or stamina to try and woo vicars' daughters.
(Brief aside, as I contemplate the existence of my own three daughters: How do we know that God loves vicars' daughters? Well, he must do, else he wouldn't have made so many of them.)
So in our inexperience, we were not a little surprised and even shocked when we asked this Li how she was one day, and she answered, 'I'm knackered!' Was this an expression that was permissible in clergy households? Clearly it was OK, if the boss's daughter said it; yet for years afterwards, whenever we wanted to say 'I'm knackered,' we would quickly add, 'as they say at the vicarage', to legitimise it. In fact, it became a catch-all saying whenever any of us or our children uttered something slightly dubious or off-colour. 'As they say at the vicarage ...'
Since becoming a vicar myself I know that the language used in vicarages - if this one is at all typical - can be just as florid and purple as anywhere else. It's not the vicar's daughters, but their father, who is the usual offender. As James says, no one can tame the tongue; it's a restless evil, full of deadly poison; so he obviously knew a thing or two about vicars, too.
I was reminded of this a couple of weeks ago when a young mum in the congregation said to another one, who had said she was knackered, 'We don't use words like that in our family.' I think I was being appealed to as a referee: 'There's nothing wrong with it, is there?' Well, does it come from the reputable term for a person who disposes of dead or unwanted animals? (I feel like a worn-out horse being disposed of?) Or from the vulgar slang meaning testicles? (I feel like I've had them unsurgically removed?) Clearly I was the wrong person to ask.
Me, an arbiter of the language it's proper for good Christian people to use? B****r me! (As they say at the vicarage)
(Brief aside, as I contemplate the existence of my own three daughters: How do we know that God loves vicars' daughters? Well, he must do, else he wouldn't have made so many of them.)
So in our inexperience, we were not a little surprised and even shocked when we asked this Li how she was one day, and she answered, 'I'm knackered!' Was this an expression that was permissible in clergy households? Clearly it was OK, if the boss's daughter said it; yet for years afterwards, whenever we wanted to say 'I'm knackered,' we would quickly add, 'as they say at the vicarage', to legitimise it. In fact, it became a catch-all saying whenever any of us or our children uttered something slightly dubious or off-colour. 'As they say at the vicarage ...'
Since becoming a vicar myself I know that the language used in vicarages - if this one is at all typical - can be just as florid and purple as anywhere else. It's not the vicar's daughters, but their father, who is the usual offender. As James says, no one can tame the tongue; it's a restless evil, full of deadly poison; so he obviously knew a thing or two about vicars, too.
I was reminded of this a couple of weeks ago when a young mum in the congregation said to another one, who had said she was knackered, 'We don't use words like that in our family.' I think I was being appealed to as a referee: 'There's nothing wrong with it, is there?' Well, does it come from the reputable term for a person who disposes of dead or unwanted animals? (I feel like a worn-out horse being disposed of?) Or from the vulgar slang meaning testicles? (I feel like I've had them unsurgically removed?) Clearly I was the wrong person to ask.
Me, an arbiter of the language it's proper for good Christian people to use? B****r me! (As they say at the vicarage)
posted by Tony at 9/30/2004 06:05:00 pm
1 Comments:
Reminds me of a pub lunch with a friend, during which the enthralling topic of our teenaged sons came up...I shared with her the joys of a 25 mile journey during which the lads had kept up a detailed and animated discussion of different varieties of farts. I gradually became aware that the couple at the next table were looking ascance at me, and as they left the man leaned towards me and said "I hardly think a girl in your position should use language like that..."
Just as well they'd not been exposed to the original conversation, in all its technical splendour
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