C.A. from Indianapolis says that when his mother was exhausted from a long day of work, she’d describe herself as dead on foot. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Dead on Foot”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hello, my name is C.A. Perry from Indianapolis, Indiana.
C.A., welcome. What can we do for you, sir?
Well, I was calling in about an expression that was used by my late mother. She was a workaholic. She worked around the house, dusting, mopping, sweeping, just constantly working. And oftentimes when I would call her and she was very tired, she would use the expression, I am just dead on foot. And I was wondering, where would such an expression like that come from? Dead on foot.
And you took it to mean that she was basically dead tired.
Yes.
Yeah. Well, the dead for tired to completely tired comes from about the early 1800s. Most people usually say dead on one’s feet or dead on my feet. And that comes from the late 1800s. The way your mother put it, dead on foot is an unusual construction, but very similar. And it reminds me of a line from an old Saturday evening post story. There’s a story by Kenneth Harris called Dancy’s Legacy about 100 years ago. And it’s about an old man who didn’t know he was dead yet and kept moving around out of force of habit. You just get so that all the chores get to be so customary and just part of your daily ritual that the body keeps moving even though you’ve got nothing left in you.
And I can understand. I’m one of five kids myself. I can see that. And recognize your mother and my mother and know what that was like to be so tired to take care of the kids in the house and just be so tired at the end of the day. You just keep going. You’re just going through the motions. Just going through the motions, even though you’ve got nothing left in you.
So that’s what we know about that expression, C.A.
Very interesting. I listen to you guys all the time, my wife and I, and we just love your show.
Well, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Thank you for reaching out. Thank you very much.
All right. Take care now. All right. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Boy, I can identify with that. I’ve never heard that version of it. I’m dead on foot. Dead on foot. But I’m thinking about other things you might do on foot. What else would you do on foot?
Well, I’m picturing a horse, you know, who’s pulling a cart and has just been pulling all day and just kind of one foot in front of the other, not even thinking about where they’re going.
Well, I’m thinking about, well, traveling on foot as opposed to traveling on a human, traveling on foot as opposed to traveling in a car or traveling on a plane or something like that. Just the idea of trotting and plodding and the misery of it as opposed to everyone else zooming by.
Yeah.
Yeah.
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