That’s not good, for an editor! But today, I wanted to post about a Pennsylvania Dutch-ism that describes how my daughter gets as the end of the school year approaches.
She gets “reutchy” or “rutchy” (meaning rowdy, can’t sit still, etc.)
I know you guys have to have heard that one! But how do you spell it? And what’s the German background for it? (Mark, help me out!)
My name is Joan and I'm a lifelong Yorker. Throughout high school and college, I swore I was getting out of here as soon as possible. Now, a few years later, I can't think of anywhere I'd rather be. I love my town. And, as a local editor, I hear every day how much you love your towns, too. So please, connect with me and let's share what makes life in York County great. I'm here to help you enjoy this place as much as I do!
To the rescue…rutschen (v) means to slip or slide and is used many differnt ways here…as in Die Straße ist rutschig (the street is slippy) and at New Years (Silvester) we wish one another Einen Guten Rutsch! (slide good in the New Year). So that one was easy and yes, we also say one is rutschig (squirmy) when one cannot sit still..so tell your daughter ‘bleib rühig’ (pronounced blibe roohig) which means to remain quiet…Alles Gute!!!
Bis Später,
Von Österreich!
Liebe Gruße!
Mark
I’ve heard it (probably from my grandparents and father) as a verb: “Jessica, stop rutchin’ around!” I’m also not sure how to spell it in PA Dutch-speak.
I actually think I might have said this phrase in the office in the past month or so, which is really odd.
There’s a website–www.urbandictionary.com that says rutchin is a PA Dutch word meaning “shifty in movement, like a hamster.” But the website describes another meaning for the word also. Since this is a “family-oriented” blog I’ll not got into that one.
Like Jess, I remember hearing it as a small child from grandparents. Sometimes our brain plays tricks on us and will automatically bring up words from its depths like rutchin that fly off the tongue before we even know what was said.
Do you remember this one? Your hair is “strubbley”, meaning a mess. Or “shussley”, for shaking hands?
I would have spelled it rutch and I’ve even said it to patients “Go ahead and rutch up in the bed” LOL I usually say “as we say around here”, because some people will look at you like you have three eyes! I love reading these york-isms. I get made fun of for “might as well” b/c we say it “mise-well”