Crayon vs. Crown

Since moving from Chicago, IL to Trinity University in San Antonio, TX, I've learned about many aspects of the southern lifestyle that I had never come across before. Unfortunately, most of these learning experiences are unexpected, awkward, and usually come from small misunderstandings, but nonetheless, learning experiences.


For example, when I made my roommate a pointed pink crown out of construction paper for her birthday, she put it on and said, "I look like a pink crown!" Confused, I asked her to repeat what she had just said. "It makes me look like a pink crown, you know, like crayola," she explained.It took a minute to set into place. Finally, I realized that she was trying to say "Crayon".

In the midwest, you see, crayon is pronounced: "CRAN"
In the south however, crayon is pronounced "CRAY-YON" or worse, "CROWN"

While I have come to accept the "cray-yon" pronunciation as acceptable, because it really is the phonetic pronunciation of the spelling, I continue to wince when Texans say "crown". For the sake of those preciously vibrant sticks of wax that made everyone's kindergarten days a rainbow of an experience, please, respect the crayons by not confusing them with crowns.