Palilogia

Palilogia: Repetition of the same word, with none between, for vehemence. Synonym for epizeuxis.

“Help, help, help! I’ve got bad morning breath and I can’t get up.” It was my senile mother again, yelling from her big chair in the media room. She was trying to imitate a commercial and she mixed up the “Lifeline Medical Wearable Alert System” advertisement with the old Oral-B “Overnight Protect Toothpaste” advertisement.

She had the uncanny ability to imitate voices, and had been recruited by the CIA at the age of 8 to serve during WW II as a “Clandestine Voice Imitator.” She interdicted radio transmissions by imitating the voices of enemy radio operators. Her code name was “Klein Schnitzel” among her co-workers at their Langley CIA headquarters.

For example, when a German General was urging a division to retreat in an uncoded “in the clear” emergency message, she spoke over him urging it to “Attack, attack, attack!”

The CIA had special radio equipment that delayed enemy radio operators transmissions so The Imitator Cops could speak over them “excising” words phrases and filling them in with Voice-imitated messages. In the case cited above, an entire Panzer Division was obliterated when it’s already shattered effectiveness was exploited by the Americans, as it followed the Imitator’s orders.

At the War’s end my mother was decorated with a Bronze Star and was nicknamed “Atomic Bomb” for the important role she played in bringing the war to a close more more quickly than it otherwise would’ve been.

She was 11 years old when the war ended. With my grandparents help, she put together a vaudeville-type act. She would begin being Churchill and delivering his famous “We Shall Fight Them on the Beaches” speech, and the take requests from the audience. One of the favorites was Clark Gable’s “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” from “Gone With the Wind.”

She went on to work with Mel Blanc imitating his Warner Brothers cartoon characters’s voices, enabling Blanc to take a break, and also, increase cartoon production. She made extra millions for the studios, but had to work behind the scenes and never got credit for her massive contribution to the Warner Brothers bottom line. But, she was generously rewarded for her work and be came a millionaire in 1959. At that point she retired.

In her retirement, she learned how to imitate bird songs, and learned the song every bird in Tory “Peterson’s “North American Birds.” She appeared as a recurring guest on the “Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson, and chortled her way into the heart of America.

Things started going down hill a few years ago. The first sign was doing a Daffy Duck imitation when she was asked to do a Mallard duck. She said “Sufferin’ succotash,” one of Daffy’s famous catchphrases. Soon after, when asked to a woodpecker, she did Woody Woodpecker’s “Heh-heh-heh-HA-ha!” instead.

It was sad seeing her lose it after such a stellar career and her outstanding service to our country. Currently, a documentary is in production that spans her life. It is titled “Voiceborn” and consists solely of archival film footage, with Taylor Swift narrating.

My mother is 104 and won’t be around much longer.

Well, I hear Teddy Roosevelt singing a cracked version of “Wooly Bully.” He’s ordering lunch. I have to go.