Translation Tuesday: I Reckon

Confession time… my family roots are a bit southern. While I definitely grew up in a large metropolitan area in the North, generations of my family before my Grandmother grew up on southern farms… granted, they were on the northern edge of what we consider the South, but they definitely had their southern idiosyncrasies. I have plenty of memories of running through tobacco fields when I was very little and visiting my great-grandfather and catching crawdads in the creek. Maybe those visits there are what helped make my transition to the deep South easier. But I digress, the point of this little insight into my history, is to set the stage for today’s translation: “I reckon”

I reckon. I soooo remember hearing my Papaw (great grandfather) say that when I was little. An answer to any number of questions: “I reckon.” Generally it means “I suppose so” or “I guess so”. There can be few other uses, but in my experience it is usually referring to “I suppose so”.  Example, in answer to a question: “I reckon.” I think the only other way I have heard it be used after that is in trying to say “I figure….”. So an example: “I reckon she will come around on party plans at some point.”

Anyway, I still hear people use it all around me living down here. Any every time it brings a bit of a memory with it of my Papaw sitting on his front porch smoking his pipe and rocking in his chair while I played in the yard. Not a bad association to have with one little phrase.

Other ways to use it that I missed?