My #1 Crime

The speaker reads a short story called "My Number One Crime" and discusses unfamiliar words and phrases used in the story. She explains the meaning of words such as sin, reckon, mull over, grouchy, stay-at-home mom, tiptoeing, cherry on top, epiphany, eureka, chummy up, confounded, sever, buffer, homebody, dwindled, mend broken fences, bear the brunt, and balm. The story is about the protagonist's tendency to say the wrong things and the impact it had on her relationship with her mother and now her husband. She reflects on her past mistakes and how she has become more cautious with her words. She also mentions that her husband's understanding and kindness help heal the wounds caused by her words. Hello and welcome back to the English Online for Pros podcast. This is Sarah Salazar. Today I'm going to be reading a short story of mine to you. I will be revealing at the end of this short story words that I think might be unfamiliar to my audience, such as metaphors, or American sayings, or simply vocabulary that I believe you might not be familiar with. So let us commence. This short story is called My Number One Crime. This little sin of mine goes way back, as far as I reckon I could talk. My husband once asked me, what did you get in trouble for the most when you were younger? I had to mull over that one. I remember my mom being super grouchy in her stay-at-home mom days, but to be honest, I had to do a mental rewind to figure it out. What had I done to cause that look of hers that I had mentally frozen on pause in my memories? Accidentally woken her up from a nap? Our floors were so creaky. Tiptoeing certainly didn't help. That was only the cherry on top. Arguing with my brother? I guess. She used to call us cats and dogs. As I started to peel back the layers of my memory, it started coming back to me. Hang on. Epiphany. Eureka. I think I found it. My number one crime. I was always saying the wrong thing. Always. At least my brother and I learned to chummy up eventually, but I never got that far with my mother. It was so bad that I lived in fear of special days, because somehow my confounded tongue always found a way to ruin it. Words left me that got under her skin like a poison that only served to sever us from each other until we could only exist as two sister-separate mountain peaks. Neighbors, somewhere in the same mountain range, with my siblings and father in between as a buffer. Sometimes it happened by accident. And other times, not so much. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Why couldn't I get my big mouth under control? My words, my first love, and my curse, I saw them too late as they left my mouth in sound waves. Mental hands lunging out too late, trying to desperately reel them back in. The aftertaste. So nasty in my mouth. I'm a homebody now, so my victims have dwindled since then. And I just got to say, thank God I meant that wholeheartedly. And while my mother and I still mend broken fences, my poor husband, he bears the brunt now. But his tender heart is a balm to my sting. Alright you guys, so I hope you enjoy that short story of mine. Let's go ahead and begin reviewing the vocabulary and phrases. So there is a word I say here at the beginning. This old sin of mine. What is a sin? For those who are not familiar with religion, sin is also a word to mean offense. Okay? And here I refer to the sin as my crime. So that's my offense, the crime. I also said, as far as I reckon I could talk. What does reckon mean? Reckon means to figure something out or to consider. Later on I said, I had to mull over that one. What does that mean? It means I had to think about it for a while. I couldn't automatically remember what I had gotten in trouble for. I mentioned the mother as grouchy. What does grouchy mean? It means irritable, to be ill-humored, bad-tempered, or grumpy. Okay? I had to call the mother a stay-at-home mom. So it is usually the parent, traditionally the mother, although that is changing today, that stays home to care for the household, the house, and the family. Okay. So I also mentioned to rewind. That means to go back. Okay. I mentioned I was tiptoeing. That it didn't help. What is tiptoeing? To walk on the tips of your toes, almost like a ballerina, for the purpose of not making any noise, at least in this context. It is used physically. It can also mean, depending on the context, when you are trying to get to the point with someone, but you are afraid of offending them. So we can say to tiptoe around the topic or the subject. Okay? Let's see. What else? I have here the phrase, the cherry on top. The cherry on top originally is a phrase that means, like, to top things off in a positive way. However, I use it here sarcastically. So here, sarcastically, it means what made the offense worse. Okay? Well, when it is not used sarcastically, it means the opposite. Right? Which means, like, the top thing that made something the best. Okay. So then later on, I said, epiphany. Eureka. Okay. Epiphany means a sudden realization of something. So that is the moment where I say, oh, now I remember what it was that I had done. Eureka. It is a Greek word. However, we do say it commonly in the USA, and it means I have found it. So in other words, I remember now what my crime was. I have found the memory. What else? I said that I learned to chummy up with my brother. At least my brother and I learned to chummy up. What does that mean? What does that mean? To sort of gang up together, or in other words, to become friends. And then I called my tongue confounded. My confounded tongue always found a way to ruin it. Confounded comes from the verb confound, meaning to be cursed. So my cursed tongue. Okay. So the words that I would say served to sever us from each other. To sever means to cut. It can be physical here. It is metaphorical. So it means to cut in the sense of causing a separation. So my words caused a separation between mother and daughter. Okay. Another word used here says my siblings and a father were in between as a buffer, serving as a buffer. What is a buffer? It is something that serves to protect as a barrier. Such as a person or a thing that shields, protects another person from something. Okay. Finally, at nearly the end, I mention the word homebody. That I am now a homebody. What is a homebody? A person who likes spending time at home rather than going out and socializing. The next word is dwindled. So my victims have dwindled. What does that mean? It means they have minimized. They have lessened. So the people that I fend now are less because now I'm a homebody because I'm hardly going out. That's what it means. Then I have the phrase to mend broken fences. Okay. And I still mend broken fences with my mother. That's what it says in the story. It is an American saying that it means to repair a relationship damaged by either an argument or disagreement. Then nearly closer to the end, I said he, in reference to the husband, bears the brunt now. What does it mean to bear the brunt? Okay. So the brunt means the worst part or impact of something. So now he is the one dealing with the worst impact now. Because, you know, you become a couple and you guys are the ones interacting the most now. So now it's not so much the interaction between mother and daughter that is being repaired. But now that the protagonist is married, now the one dealing with the issues is the husband. Okay. So now lastly, I have the word balm. His tender heart is a balm to my sting. So balm is a type of healing ointment. And why would he need to have a balm? Why is his tender heart a balm? So it's a healing ointment for my sting. The sting is a metaphor for the protagonist's words. Okay. Okay. So I hope we went over all the vocabulary that you might have had questions on and phrases. So if there's still any doubt, please go ahead and comment below. And I can make a reel on it later on Instagram. So thank you so much again for coming back. And I hope you enjoyed the podcast. I'll see you guys next time. Have a wonderful day. Thank you.