Word of the day - Gobadee

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"Gobadee" is a word I coined when my daughter, Corey, (now 28 years old) was around 2 years old. Pronounced [gob-ahh-dee], it rhymes with "lob a pea."  The reason for the creation of this word stems from Corey's inability at that age to roll her tongue and make the "L" sound.  "Love" usually came out as "wuf." She seemed a little irritated that she couldn't make the "L" sound, so she began to avoid using that word and any other word that started with the "L" sound.  Well, I didn't want my little girl refraining from telling me or her mother that she loved us, so I made up a word for her.

On a whim one evening as I was tucking her in bed, I said "good night, Corey . . . and gobadee."  She looked at me quizzically, wondering what this new word meant.  I explained to her that when she was a baby, she couldn't speak "grown-up" talk; she spoke in "baby-talk."  And the baby-talk word for "I love you" was "gobadee."  I told her that I liked the sound of that word and wanted to keep using it with her and ONLY her.  She was intrigued by the word and clapped her hands like any new kid exposed to something viewed as magical or a shared secret.  And thereafter, we said that word to each other when I tucked her into bed for the evening.  Her mother thought it was sweet, and she began using it with Corey, too.

Years passed and Corey eventually mastered the "L" word, but she would still say gobadee to me at night and use it in birthday cards and Father's Day cards to me.  For no particular reason and without some sort of grandiose announcement, she stopped using gobadee for the most part when she reached her teens.  I thought the word would fall into the category of lost languages like Aramaic . . . until she used it in her closing with ae letter I received from her not so long ago.

It's a pleasant feeling when something good out of the past strikes you in the present and brings back so many memories and emotions.  Right now, her use of that word has made me feel pretty old, but it's a good feeling of being old.  Perhaps "old" is the wrong word.  I feel enriched and blessed to have had some pretty wonderful things in my life.  Corey is one of them.  I have a feeling she's going to pass that word on to her children when that time comes.

Legacies can come in many different forms. One of mine will come in the form of a make-believe word. Somehow, with my love for the English language, I find that strikingly appropriate.