Plum

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hey, this is Gwen from San Diego.

Hiya, Gwen.

Whoa, hello, Gwen.

Hey, how you doing?

My question has to do with the use or the origin of the word plum. Not plum as in a fruit, but more as an exclamatory adjective. And the only way I know how to sort of further clarify what my question relates to is to tell you a little story about when I was growing up in the South.

Great.

And where was this?

Well, I am an Atlanta native that lived in Georgia all my life, and my grandparents lived in a little tiny town in north Georgia. We were visiting my grandparents, as we often did, when I was about four years old. And at that time, my grandparents had a little dachshund named Brownie. And we were up there, and I did not know nor did I understand that Brownie was with child and expecting a litter any day now. And I picked the little dog up and turned him upside down and looked at his tummy and said, honey, you plummied up with chiggers. Chiggers, by the way, meaning mosquito bites.

Sure, sure.

Oh, not chiggers as in the little red bugs, the little tiny little ticks?

Well, at four years old, to me, chiggers were mosquito bites. And the little tummy looked like it was covered with mosquito bites, which they were not. So what do you know about that term plum? Is that just an old southern term?

It’s a wonderful southern term. You’re bringing back all kinds of memories for me, Gwen. I can hear my Aunt Mazo saying something like, oh, I don’t know, them puppies been chasing each other round and round, and now they’re all plum tuckered out.

Exactly, yes.

Right, right.

I can hear it.

Right.

Well, let me ask you this, Gwen. Do you know what a plum line is?

Is that something in construction?

Yeah, yeah, the kind of line that has a weight on it.

Yeah.

Right.

So you use a plumb line to make sure something’s vertical because that plumb line goes straight down to the ground, and it’s perfectly perpendicular to a flat surface, right?

Yeah.

Now, the plumb weight on the end of that was traditionally made out of lead.

And the Latin word plumbum means lead.

Oh, you’re kidding.

No.

And the symbol for lead on the elements chart is?

PB, is that right?

I don’t remember.

And, Gwen, who’s the person who comes to fix what at least used to be lead pipes in your house?

Oh, gosh, a plumber.

A plumber.

Isn’t that amazing?

Yes, it’s amazing.

See the light bulb going on?

It is.

Yes.

All right.

But wait a second.

What does that have to do with chiggers?

Well, we won’t get into that.

But other than the fact that the little dog was expecting a litter any day now, and it was a little female dog.

-huh.

So they were not chiggers.

Yeah, right.

Well, now, so I guess you’re headed here, Martha.

We’ve seen a transformation then, right?

Clearly we went from plum, meaning something vertical, up and down, to…

Right, absolutely, completely straight, as exactly as a plum lime.

Okay.

I never would have guessed that.

Well, thank you all so much for answering my question.

You’re welcome.

You know, Gwen, it’s not just a Southern phrase, although I think that’s one of the places where it’s kind of set up house in the United States.

It actually goes back several hundred years.

Yeah.

Wow.

Well, thank you so much.

You’re welcome.

We’re glad to take your call.

I love the show.

All right.

Thanks a lot for calling, Gwen.

Thank you, Grant.

Thank you, Gwen.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

We’d love to take your calls about Southernisms, regionalisms, dialect, colloquialisms, and what Grandma used to say.

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