cra-un

I was discussing an old episode of The Simpsons at work the other day. In that episode we find out that Homer is actually naturally smarter than average, but that an incident from his childhood in which a crayon was shoved into his cranial cavity caused him to lose most of his intelligence. The crayon is removed and Homer learns that life is more difficult for those who are intelligent. Out of cowardice he has a new crayon inserted where the old one was and he returns to his former dense self. When I tried to explain the scenario, though, the meaning of my words was lost.

Apparently, almost everyone pronounces the word "crayon" wrong. I say this because they pronounce it differently than I do. I pronounce the word with a short "a" (as in "hat") and end with a soft "un." So, when I say, "crayon," it sounds like "cra-un." The popular way to pronounce the word is roughly the way it is spelled, though I have noticed that even the people who believe this is how the word is pronounced vary somewhat in how they actually enunciate the word. I also think some people use a short "a" when they think they are using a long "a."

When I talked about the crayon in Homer's brain cavity my audience was not sure what I was talking about. Was I describing a cranberry and just shortening the word? Did I invent a new word? For my part, I couldn't figure out what the confusion was about.

For the last two days I have had to try to convince five or six other people that they are the ones who are pronouncing the word wrong. No one seems to accept my logic, though. I guess Homer was right. Life is harder for the intelligent.