My Mensch

My Mensch
Originally uploaded by allysther.

The three of us were in the basement, staying cool and doing a load of laundry. Not at all surprisingly, the cats were with us. They love the basement because it is much cooler than the rest of the house, but they don’t go on their own because they cannot work the lights. Poor girls.

I had finished loading the washer and announced that it was time to head upstairs, but only after we stopped to pet the kitties. The boy responded by petting the nearest cat while saying “Mensch!”, which is the German word for “man”. It is used as a minor curse, as in “Oh man!”

The amusing thing (beyond the boy cursing in German!) is that the word also exists in Yiddish, where the meaning is a “good man”. Precisely the type of person who would stop what he was doing to pet a kitty.