When you’re referring to someone who might be a bit unstable, would you describe them as tetched or touched? One might be unfamiliar.
Every part of the country has little words and phrases that seem more common there than anywhere else. I watching a favorite TV show and heard an example of such a word. But some people might have heard the line of dialog and wondered whether they actually heard the word tetched or touched.
The TV show in question was The Andy Griffith Show. It starred Andy Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor in the fictional North Carolina town of Mayberry. Don Knotts starred as Deputy Barney Fife. In the episode “Andy Saves Barney’s Morale,” Taylor has to go out of town and leaves Fife in charge.
Andy expresses a little concern about leaving his sometimes-bumbling deputy in charge while he’s away. But when he returns from his trip, all seems nice and quiet in town. That is, until Fife leads him back into the courthouse and Taylor sees dozens of townsfolk packed like sardines in the jail cells. Fife went on a ticket spree, arresting everyone for the simplest “offenses.”
One of those arrestees is a character named Jud Fletcher, played by character actor Burt Mustin. When Taylor, who doubles as the town’s justice of the peace, asks about Fletcher’s crime, Fife tells him he’s accused of disturbing the peace. Specifically, he says “Old Jud” got angry during a checkers game and threw the checkerboard at his competitor.
That’s when Fletcher delivers the line: “He’s tetched, Andy. I ain’t had the strength to disturb the peace nigh onto 30 years!”
Teched or touched?
If you listen to the actor deliver the line, he clearly says tetched, not touched. But I would guess many people have never even heard of the word tetched.
In fact, both words can mean someone who’s mentally unstable, which is what the line is meant to convey.
Merriam-Webster says the second meaning listed for touched is “slightly unbalanced mentally.” But when the word touched is involved, you’d usually hear the phrase “touched in the head.”
But what about this tetched business? That can’t actually be a word that has just flown so low under everyone’s radar, can it?
Apparently, it can! The word dates back to 1930 and was a U.S. colloquial variant of touched in the “emotionally disturbed” sense. Merriam-Webster says it means “mentally unsound.”
So both words can refer to someone who’s a little off-balance, a little “out there.” But if you use the word tetched rather than touched, people might look at you with a confused expression. That shouldn’t surprise you: that variant is definitely less well-known. On the other hand, if you believe in keeping a perfectly good word alive, use it to your heart’s desire.
The worst thing that could happen is that someone might think you’re the one who’s “tetched.” But would that be such a high price to pay?
