Word of the Day- Mary and the Month of May

While substitute teaching, the other day, I felt a tug on my pants leg, and then a little helium filled voice, said to me, “Mrs. Cruz what is a Codi… Wom… Ple?”

“hmmmm, Coddiwomple” I repeated, “I Honestly I have no idea.”  I reached for my PID, which means, my Personal Information Device, which means, my I phone and looked it up.  I looked down at this sweet child and said,

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“It means to wander or travel in a purposeful yet unplanned manner. If you were to use it in a sentence it would be something like this, “I am in the mood to coddiwomple, I will be back in a week.”

Driving home I was captivated by this new weird yet charming word. It sounds like such a lovely thing to do and what many of my retired friends are in fact doing. Upon further research it is word play on an old idea. Explorers, philosophers, and artists have had the same mindset, venturing out into the unknown without a planned destination. In Hawaiian language, they call it going, “Holo, Holo, which means to go riding or sailing or on a stroll.  

               It is no wonder, people tired of a long dark winter, begin to coddiwomple in May. Spring time is here and many are certainly in the mood to coddiwomple! I feel like telling folks, “Hey, I’m going coddiwompling…. (is that even a word?)  I will be back in a week, forget about me for a while!”

 In early spring when there is still a nip in the air, tourists have not yet flooded popular sites, the sun is more often seen by our retinas giving us precious vitamin D, people are anxious to get out and get moving.  Long before the invention of this new cute new word, coddiwomple, it resided in us, deep in our human DNA. The practice of expelling winter, in early May was considered the start of new growth and a call to journey.

               Continuing my drive, I began to see statues of the Virgin Mary adorn a few porches and I am also reminded that the month of May is also set aside to honor Mary, Mother of God. Not just a day in May, but the entire month!

A quote by an unknown author reads,

"May, the month of sunshine, blooming flowers, and endless possibilities." 

Upon returning to my class a week later, I looked across the sea of sad young faces yearning to be outside on this fine spring day and said,

“Let’s put our books away and go on a coddiwomple.”