hey! (11/4/24)
aside
hey… an expression of joy or an interrogation, or calling attention, and sometimes implying a challenge, while nowadays increasingly replacing hi or hello as a greeting or basically thrown around willy-nilly… it seems to hark back in recorded sources as far as the 12th century, either from the latin, hei, which was actually a cry of grief or fear, while heia being an interjection denoting joy … in the 16th and 17th century there was a popular country dance called a hey, although probably not surprising if you hadn’t heard of it being that I’m not sure you’ll have seen it on ‘Strictly…’ nor likely to anytime soon… then we have heyday, as yes, or its plural, heydays, ah yes again, a culmination or climax of vigour or prosperity and most commonly used in nostalgia terms, reference to a time of innocence perhaps, or freedom, a more carefree time perhaps, the “best of times” being ones heyday… it’s not relating to hay, as in the stuff of hay bales which horses are most fond of or which people are commonly found sitting on during a hoedown, an agricultural term for a time when workers lay down their hoes and trip the barn fantastic, a line dancer’s version of a ceilidh, nor does it relate to haymaking, no, not the raking and collecting of hay in a hayrick, but the naughty version of having a romp in the hay… wahey!… nope, it’s neither of those but instead goes back to heyda, probably from the 16th century, but who ever really knows, meaning an exclamation of surprise or playfulness, the latter tying in almost nicely with the modern idea of the word heyday as being that more carefree or successful time… like a lot of words, context is everything, such as thinking back to a time on your youth might be regarded as your heyday, or, when referencing a musician or band at their best, that would be regarded as their heyday… needless to say, heyday is now inextricably wrapped up in a haze of nostalgia, this word itself tossed around as much as ‘hey’, like confetti, more often than not misapplied to good times past when the origin of the word itself refers to times of pain or sadness, the almost polar opposite… but in there lies another tale on intrigue……
beside
if I wasn’t me, I might well be you, which would be decidedly weird, especially for you……
seaside
I think perhaps it’s time I wrote something interesting here…. something interesting……
© 2024 robert greig
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