Once More With Feeling

While it has settled down to maybe once a month, I still get emails and messages berating me for using the term 'The Poor Sod' when referring to the guy who is, at this very moment, upstairs snaking the drain in the bathroom sink.

From the time columnists have been referring to spouses/significant others/etc, they have dug deep for something they can use as shorthand without delivering up the person's actual name. See, we do this for a living; there are often others who still deserve a degree of anonymity; my kids got a say as they came of age - they too had fake names when they were younger.

So, the fact that most of the columnists I dug up for comparison were male wasn't lost on me. 'The Wife', 'The Goddess', 'She Who Must Be Obeyed', 'The Boss', and on and on. You get it. The very first time I ever referred to him as anything, it was an in an auto column. 'The Poor Sod Who Lives With Me'. Where'd it come from? Well, first off, for the legions of you who think I am unaware that the origins of the word are British, and that the origins of the word are less than complimentary, stop. My Mom was a Brit. Her pet name for my father was often Poor Sod. The cat was often called the Silly Sod. Yes, 'sod' descends from sodomites. I get it, I know. But the word has evolved to the point that the standard the Toronto Star uses for usage (Canadian Oxford Dictionary) includes current acceptability of the term. Also, anyone who has to live with me deserves at least a small, sympathetic head shake.

IT WAS A TERM OF ENDEARMENT in my home growing up. I'm sorry if your sensibilities get a little bruised by it, but I'm not sanitizing my work to paint out the crazy-natured basis of my upbringing. There is no derogatory intent at all. None. If a Brit wins a lottery, he'd be referred to as a lucky sod in more than one publication; bet on it.

I stopped answering mail on this subject about a year ago. I got tired. It's been a repeated cycle by people who a)if they read my work, would know my Mom's origins, and should twig that I understand what I'm saying and b)I write from my gut, and it is what it is, to batter a bad term to death.

What I write about my family is cleared with my family. And quite frankly, if they're cool with it, I think everyone else should be.