Talking Southern  —  Departing Quickly, Southern Style

     Southerners tend to be a languid people: we move slowly, talk slowly, and generally take our time about things in effort to savor the ever-lapsing, never-to-be-replaced moments of our lives.  Because we tend to have little experience in doing things quickly, suddenly, or perhaps surprisingly, we have an expression that helps us to express when things do go faster than we expected them to.  In trying to think of specific examples of this expression, your compiler is struck with the belief that the expression he has in mind is almost always used in connection with departures or various sorts. 

     One hears it among the highly educated, the barely educated, and in all conditions between.  It is, “up and ________,” blank to be supplied by the speaker depending on the circumstances. A small handful of possibilities follows:

• I was meaning to call old John to see how he was getting along, but he up and died before I could get around to it. 
• I don’t know where Sam went.  He up and took off without saying a word about where he was going or when he might be back.
• Bubba was nearing his parole date, but he up and tried an escape the week before, and got several years tacked onto his original sentence.

     Your compiler is sure there are numerous permutations, but he hopes the three given are sufficient to illustrate his point.    He has no clue why we Southerners say that, but one hears it rather often.  It appears to have nothing to do with – and in fact almost certainly predates by several decades – the familiar line from the 1960s cartoon, “Up and at ‘em,  Atom Ant!”

     Finally, a note on pronunciation may be in order.  Seldom will one hear perfect enunciation employed with the use of “up and ______.”    The phrase is almost always used for emphasis, and it generally sounds like, “up’m.”

     Your compiler, upon finishing this column, up’m left the keyboard for a quick walk around to stretch his stove-up back.