Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Too Many Syllables

Those that know me on a personal basis are aware of the fact that...

I JUST GOT MARRIED!!! YAY ME!! *He's mine now evil laugh*

It should be noted that my delectable husband and I were engaged for quite a lengthy period of time before saying the vows; about a year and a half. During this time, while I was ECSTATIC to finally be on the happy road to matrimony, I absolutely had the most problem addressing my betrothed as my 'fiance.' Why you ask? Because the word has too many syllables, dammit!

It should also be taken under consideration that my now husband and I courted for a period of just over ten years before finally tying the knot. Yes, we dated for over a damn decade. That's 10 years, or roughly, 120 months, 520 weeks, 3650 days, 87600 hours, 5256000 minutes, and 315360000 seconds of calling him my 'boyfriend.' See? Two syllables. Boy Friend. Easy Peasy!!
That is, until we got engaged, and everyone kept correcting me that he was no longer my easy and comfortable, two syllable, 'boyfriend' any longer, but some frenchy, uptight sounding, way too snazzy for my tastes, three syllable 'fiance.'

W.T.F.

How does one go from being the easy to say and not hoity-toity "Oh, he's my boyfriend, like, you know?" to the utterly stuck up and painful to say, "Daaahling, he's my Fianceeee..." I mean, there's even supposed to be a damn accent on the word! (Thank you, Blogger, for not picking that up!)

My frustration knew no bounds for pretty much our entire engagement as I struggled to conform to societal norms and remember to say this confounded word. At first, it was pure dumb luck that I forgot to say it. It was easy to get away with the 'boyfriend' slip in the beginning months because we had just got engaged, and old habits die hard, ya know? However, as the months passed, I found it harder and harder to use that excuse as people expected me to be familiar and comfortable with my new arrangement, at least enough to change his status while talking about him. Jeez people! It's a long and annoying word! ...So, I tried it a few times, and even pretended to swoon to convince people that I was excited about the dribble language coming out of my mouth. (Mind you, I was indeed SO FUCKING EXCITED TO FINALLY BE GETTING MARRIED!!! Make no mistake about that! It's just the wording that got in the way...)

I find myself thinking of that riveting season-ending episode of "Supernatural" when Castiele is about to smite Michael before the apocalypse takes over the world, and what phrase does he use to get the Archangel's attention??  "Hey! Ass-Butt!"

Yeah, that's about how I felt every time I tried to warm up to the word 'fiance...'
Ass-Butt.

Here's a little etymology information on my most loathed word, as I am frustrated with it so, I must know where the confounded thing comes from...
Basically, 'fiance' is a French word for 'betrothed.' 'Fiance' being the male equivalent and 'fiancee' being the female. You can even doll it up and put an accent on the 'e' to make it look purty.
'Betrothed.'
I would have MUCH rather have said that word. At least it doesn't sound like you slapped someone while they were saying something: "Fians.. *slap* HEY!"

By and by, I finally gave up on trying to conform to society's norms and kept referring to the man as my boyfriend, and when people got in a huff about it, I simply said, "It's too many dang syllables."
It's odd how quick that shut most people up.
Smile and nod.

Now I am sitting extremely smug in content land as I no longer have to banter with horrible words to refer to my HUSBAND. God, I love that word. Simple, direct, to the point. Husband. So much love in that one word.
Say it with me, 'Husband.' ...Doesn't that just make you smile?
See? Easy Peasy.
It's all in the syllables.