18 Southern Expressions for Courtship

Northern women get a free pass with regard to dating Southern men. However, Northern men will need a little extra guidance for Southern Belles.

There are a lot of do’s, but only two don’t’s that you will not recover from: 1.) Save your Jeff Foxworthy jokes for the Jersey shore. Southern isn’t Redneck. And 2) Do not attempt a Southern accent, you’ll sound like an idiot. Southern women are just like the other women of the 19th Century.

Here is a short list of the dos:

Always open doors.

Always offer to pay.

Always help a lady with her chair.

Always stand when she enters a room or get up to leave a room.

Always remember that behind that sweet façade is a young lady that can field dress a deer, be nice.

Here are the Southern sayings you need to know in regard to courtship.

Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, if it wasn’t for women our hearts would rust.

”Save a boyfriend for a rainy day ­and another, in case it doesn’t rain.” – Mae West

Bait the cow to catch the calf.

Meaning: Be nice to your significant others’ mothers.

Don’t blame the cow when the milk gets sour.

“Statistically speaking, there is a 65 percent chance that the love of your life is having an affair. Be very suspicious.” – Scott Dikkers

Don’t he think he’s cock o’ the hen­house?

Also: Sad is the house where the hen crows and the rooster is silent!

Even a dog knows the difference between being stumbled over and kicked.

”Every time you try to flirt with her, a puppy dies.” – Maureen Johnson

Give me some sugar.

Meaning: Give me a kiss

I am sugar in your hand.

“Flirting is a woman’s trade, one must keep in practice.” – Charlotte Brontë

If promises were persimmons, possums could eat good at her place.

Note: In Pete Seeger’s song “Raccoon’s got a bushy tail,” possum hunts ended at the foot of a persimmon tree.

Marriage is an expensive way for a man to get free laundry.

Rather than: Don’t get married. Find a woman you hate and give her a house.

Marry in haste, repent in leisure.

“Flirting with madness was one thing; when madness started flirting back, it was time to call the whole thing off.” – Rohinton Mistry

Rooster one day, a feather duster the next.

“Times go by turns, and chances change by course, from foul to fair, from better happy to worse.” – Robert Southwell

She got her trotting harness on.

Meaning: She is dressed to be noticed. Note: Since its humble beginnings as a farmers’ sport, trotting has become an international favorite. Tracks devoted to harness races exclusively appeared all over the world.

She was batting her eyes like a toad in a hail storm.

“I hope to start enjoying flirting again when I’m 70, like my mother did.” – Felicity Kendal

Sure as the vine twines ’round the stump, you are my darlin’ sugar lump.

“I’m worth more dead than alive. Don’t cry for me after I’m gone; cry for me now.” – Marlene Dietrich

That man has got a thumping gizzard for a heart.

Note: A “gizzard” is a bird’s muscular alimentary canal that has usually thick muscular walls and a tough horny lining for grinding food.

Wasn’t nothin’ between him and the Lord but a smile.

“If you can make a girl laugh, you can make her do anything.” – Marilyn Monroe

Well, ain’t he just the tom­cat’s kitten?

“All my life I’ve been flirting. I’m no different. I still carry on the same way.” – Guy Laliberte

You can catch more bees with honey.

“Why slap them on the wrist with feather when you can belt them over the head with a sledgehammer.” – Katharine Hepburn

Tim Heaton is an Ole Miss Alumnus from Southaven, Mississippi who supports The Flagship in a variety of public relations efforts. He is a contributing writer to HottyToddy.com and actively volunteers his technical, database and social media expertise to several community service organizations in his current home in Morristown, New Jersey and in his home state of Mississippi. He has been awarded over a dozen US Patents in technology and is also a published author, chef and physical fitness enthusiast.

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