In Good Season

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Frances Barrow from Indianapolis.

Hi, Frances, welcome.

How are you doing?

Okay, how are you guys?

Doing well, what’s going on?

Well, I was interested in an expression that my father used to use that I haven’t heard anyone else say ever, and I just thought I’d check with you guys.

Okay.

And the expression is, we’re in good season.

And he would say it if, like, the family was in the car going someplace, and my mom would fret that we were running late.

And he would say, don’t worry. We’re in good season.

And I assume that season just is another word for time.

We’re in good time, so maybe that’s not so unusual.

But I’ve never heard anyone else say it, and I just wanted to see if you guys had heard the expression.

Interesting.

Frances, what kind of work did your father do?

Well, he was an engineer.

He got his degree in mechanical engineering from Purdue University and definitely had that engineering frame of mind.

But he read broadly and loved crossword puzzles.

So definitely he was a word person.

I ask that because I just wondered if he had an agricultural background because that really is the reference here.

Yeah, it’s related to vegetables and fruit being in season.

Yeah.

Okay.

So June is the time of the year for cherries, perhaps.

They are in season.

Yeah.

And you can find this in dictionaries as far back as Noah Webster’s first dictionaries in the 1820s.

It’s right in there.

There’s an entry for it explained in full.

So at one point, this was widespread enough that the single most read dictionary of the era, it was in virtually every house, it was in there.

And people probably knew it and spoke it and had it.

And it was part of their idiolex.

Okay, so comparing themselves to fruit that’s in seed.

Well, anything that can happen at the right time of year.

If you’re agricultural, there is a time to plant and a time to reap and sow.

How does the Bible verse go, Martha?

Yeah, time to reap, time to sow.

Yeah, so it’s not too early, not too late.

It’s just ripe.

And so if you’re in good season, then you’re right on time, no rush.

There’s a particular notion there that’s important, and that season isn’t a specific moment.

It’s not 7 p.m. on the 12th of December, you know, 2013.

It is like a give or take kind of period, a little bit before and a little bit after.

It’s in this range of time.

A season is not a specific moment.

So if you’re in season, you’re like, yeah, we’re kind of in the ballpark.

Yeah, yeah, you’re in the ballpark.

Oh, well, that makes sense because when he said that, see, this was a stern and silent man most of the time.

But when he would say we’re in good season, the words just settled on us like a balm.

It was, okay, all is well.

Things are fine.

Everybody relaxed, huh?

Absolutely.

That’s lovely.

It’s such a lovely echo of an earlier time.

Well, and he very well might have picked it up, you know, from people in the area.

We’re from southern Indiana, New Albany.

And certainly he might have heard that expression just in the community.

Great. Well, Frances, thank you so much.

Thank you, Frances.

Okay, thanks for talking.

Take care now.

It’s a lovely phrase.

Bye-bye.

Sure. Bye now.

Bye-bye.

We’re in good season for you to give us a call, 877-929-9673, or send your questions in email to words@waywordradio.org.