Friday, January 05, 2007

What American accent do you have?
Your Result: The Midland

"You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and radio.

The South
The West
The Inland North
Philadelphia
The Northeast
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have?
Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Accent-free? Moi?

Sadly, and to my lifelong disappointment, true. Maybe not as true as it once was, having spent the last 30 years here in Sevier County, where nary a day passes that I don't hear someone's druthers, their fixin' to's and their painfully expressed relationships (I got a friend of mine, e.g.) But in my formative years, I was embarrassingly free of the accent that defined home - at least for my Mississippian parents. And it was all their fault, dragging me willy-nilly across the U S of A. I was born in North Carolina, moved to Virginia the first time when I was a toddler, then west to California for 7 years. Fourth grade was spent back in Virginia, in a suburb of D.C. While Nixon's presidency was unraveling I became obsessed with The Man Without A Country. Yes, the flair for drama became apparent early on. Then off to Missouri, where the people say "you'ins". Really. Finally, a move to the land of red clay mud and abandoned tires. That's right, T for Tennessee. Big ups to me for not speaking some mutant east coast/west coast slang. Um, well, mostly not, yo! And the more I think about it, the more I believe my parents should have gone to jail for child abuse/neglect. Yard darts! We had 'em! Bugs Bunny cartoons! The Three Stooges! On every afternoon right after school and could poorer role models be found? Bear attacks! Earthquakes! Proximity to Nixon! What kind of parents let their children spend entire summers in swimming holes or swimming pools? Or amuse themselves driving the family sedan solo around and around the grandparents' pastures? At the age of 10? Or play outside all day with vague directions to be home before dark?

It was a simpler time. It was a simpler place. Er, places. Were. Whatever.

Thanks, Mom. Thanks, Dad.

No comments: