Growing up on the Prairies hardly seems to qualify me as somewhat of a redneck, but I admit there has been this part of me, until now, that has secretly believed I am one. Come to think of it, I grew up listening to expressions such as “If the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise” and “Bless your heart” (only it wasn’t really a blessing … more of an insult).
Then, about 15 years ago, some friends brought over Jeff Foxworthy’s You Might Be A Redneck If… Game, and—dang it if I didn’t get every single one of the questions right (not kidding!). We nearly killed ourselves laughing, so I’ve ordered it for Christmas this year and will take the Redneck litmus test one more time … just to double-check.
Recently, I met someone in the Qwanlin Mall parking lot who greeted me with “Hi, it’s been a long time!”
I instantly shot back, “It’s been a coon’s age!” Then I burst out laughing and told her I had never, in my life, used that expression and hoped I never would again.
But it got me thinking about that near-extinct expression. How long does a raccoon live, anyway? I wondered as I turned the ignition in my KIA, still smiling. As it turns out, they may live only two or three years in the wild, but up to 20 in captivity. Well, there’s a perfect example of quality over quantity.
Now, for the idiomatic origin of “in a coon’s age”. Somewhere in the mid-1800s, this American expression took hold. The raccoon took first prize in a competition against crows (“in a crow’s age”) when folks realized that raccoons lived longer than crows. And despite the relatively-short lifespan of a coon, the expression itself conveyed the idea of a very long time—perhaps over a span of months or even years.
Then I was surprised, unpleasantly, to read that the word coon, used as a stand-alone, was and still is a racial slur. Never to be confused with “in a coon’s age”.
You’re unlikely to hear this expression, unless you have a redneck friend like me. You’re more likely to hear expressions similar in meaning, such as “forever and a day”, “in eons” (not ions … a mistake I’ve made), “in ages”, or “for an eternity” (love the hyperbole in that last one, especially as an eternity could quite literally span someone’s lifetime).
A polar opposite of this idiom would be “in a heartbeat”. Or, “in a New York minute”. I don’t believe I’ve heard that expression used before, other than in song lyrics or in books or movies. Not in real-time, though I am now definitely going to look for an opportunity to use it.
How long is a New York minute? Well, I’m guessing it’s in the blink of an eye, which is 0.1 to 0.4 seconds, according to the Harvard Database of Useful Biological Numbers (bionumbers.hms.harvard.edu/search.aspx), or as quick as a wink (I bet you’ve blinked just reading this sentence).
Anyhoo, thanks for hangin’ in with me for this idiomatic origin … It seems like a coon’s age.
