Antisthecon (an-tis’-the-con): Substitution of one sound, syllable, or letter for another within a word. A kind of metaplasm: the general term for changes to word spelling.
My new wool coat was too big. I was just a kid and it was adult XL. My arms were six niches too short to let my hands stick out the ends of the sleeves. It was yallow and green with a hooge collar and silver buttons. It came down to my knees.
Getting a new winter coat every year was a family ritual. My family was poor. My father was a dishwasher at the “Grits and Gravy Diner” out on Highway Six. If it wasn’t for the pancake mix he stole, we would never have had breakfast. My mother made hand-tailored sports coats. She would sell two or thee a year, usually around prom time at the local high school. All of them were white. She would throw in a pink carnation at no extra cost. It goes without saying, if we had to live off Ma’s sports coat business, we would’ve starved. But my mother had a rich Aunt April who was her mother’s sister.
She had been a judge in NYC in the ‘40s and ‘50s. She had sent so many criminals up the river that they called her “Judge Mississippi.” She had made tons of money and took it upon herself to buy me, “Poor Little Johnny,” a new winter coat every year. It was fine at first, but as she got older the coat-buying adventure had gotten crazier. I thought this was why I was getting the giant coat.
She tugged on it and buttoned the buttons and made me squat down in it. Two years ago, she started naming the coats after people. Last year, my coat was named Howard, after my great uncle. This year’s coat was named Charles, after my grandfather. Aunt April never approved of him. He drove a bakery delivery truck and had a kennel full of Beagles that he ran at field trials, where the dogs chased around rabbit-scented bags that were dragged through the woods and fields. I went to a couple of field trials and loved it. I would hang out in the club house and eat pumpkin pie. Grandpa ended his working days as a security guard, packing a .38 and stealing silverware. It was the highlight of Thanksgiving for me to dig into dinner with a fork stamped with logo of the place where he worked.
Anyway, I was afraid to ask Aunt April why she named my coat Charles. She was short-tempered and such a question would be considered “guff,” a nineteenth-century word for saying something stupid that could be a prelude to a listener’s ire. She waved her cane at me and yelled “I know what you’re thinking!” I apologized, but I wasn’t sure what I was apologizing for.
Aunt April had bought me and my cousin Joe sailor suits when we were really little kids. I have a bunch of pictures of us saluting each other in my back yard. That was the only time I wore it. That was ok with me. I couldn’t understand why she had bought me a sailor suit, but I could understand the winter coat. It was to keep me warm, when otherwise, I would’ve worn the same coat until it was rag. Then, I realized that was her plan with the giant coat. She was getting old and was probably concerned that she may be buying her last coat for me. It had to last a few years.
The coat would certainly last to junior high school, and it did, and beyond. It kept me warm for years. Even though Dad had saved his wages, took out a loan, and bought the diner, and we could afford all the winter coats we wanted, I stuck with the last one Aunt April had bought me.
In a weird way, I miss Aunt April. I did some research on her and found out she was one of the first women to be admitted to the American Bar Association.
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
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