Taking care?

[sawyl]

Notes and Queries in today's Guardian feature various answers, including one which cited Heidegger, to a question about why we say, "take care", assuming we do, when someone leaves. One of the respondents said that he believed that "goodbye" was short for "God be with you" and, as fewer people believed in God, more of people opted for "take care" instead.

All of which got me to thinking about the things I say when I take my leave. I realised that I almost never say goodbye, instead generally opting for "see you" when face to face and "cheers" or "ciao" on the phone. I suspect this use of the latter marks me out as terminally middle class.

Comments

[vincel.livejournal.com]

I'd noticed before that you always say "see you."

[sawyl.livejournal.com]

If only I said, "Be seeing you", then I could claim it came from The Prisoner. As it is, I suspect it comes from my pater, which makes it rather less than cool...