Massachusetts monikers make me long to buy a grinder at a spa

Having lived and worked in Maine for 30 years now, there’s no denying that I love the place. But I was born and raised in Massachusetts, and there are some bits and pieces of Bay State vocabulary that, as a native son, I prefer over what is seen and heard elsewhere.

Two examples of this caught my eye during a recent visit to “the commonwealth,” as they like to say in Massachusetts, which goes in for grand self-descriptions. Both of them involve terminology that may be used in other locales too, but not in the country as a whole.

Here’s Exhibit A. A liquor store in the Bay State is known as a package store. Always. As in, without exception. Wikipedia claims the term is common in Alabama, Connecticut, Georgia, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. (Talk about strange bedfellows.) This is said to be the case because liquor purchased in those states "must be packaged in sealed bottles or other containers when it is taken from the store."

Growing up in Massachusetts, I never heard anyone describe a joint that sells booze as a liquor store. Ever. I don’t remember hearing “packie” too much either, although it's a popular Massachusetts nickname for such a business. "Package store" was standard terminology in our neck of the woods. That’s what the sign on the store said, and that’s the word we always used.

In a similar vein, I was pleased to see, during my recent visit, that sandwich shops in Massachusetts still refer to a submarine sandwich by its proper name: a grinder. The word is commonly used on menus, and frequently heard when customers place their orders.

A sub is not a hoagie or a hero in the Bay State. And it certainly is not an Italian (sometimes pronounced eye-talian), which is a Maine term. Grinder probably is an odd-sounding sub synonym to the uninitiated, but it never occurred to me back in the day that there might be other ways of describing one of my favorite meals.

Here too, Wikipedia has weighed in. "One theory has the name coming from Italian-American slang for a dock worker, among whom the sandwich was popular." Another theory holds that the grinder's crunchy bread requires a lot of chewing, aka, grinding. Hence, grinder.

Whatever. All I know is that if someone ever compiles a Massachusetts-to-English dictionary to help tourists and transplants, “grinder” and “package store” are sure to be among the most frequently consulted entries. After all, visitors and newcomers need to educate themselves if they hail from some poor, benighted region where misguided folks refer to a bubbler as a water fountain, and a spa as a corner store.