Pahk ya Boston accent right here

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Working in news can be kind of a bummer these days. Our democracy is teetering. New Epstein revelations besiege us daily. The weather is cold and gray.

Enter 84-year-old Sid McDonough, with one charming voicemail.

McDonough was the first reader to respond via voicemail to a recent piece by the Globe’s Beth Teitell documenting the death of the Boston accent. Assuming it would be a hotly debated topic, I invited readers to ring us up. But I was worried, with so much else going on, no one would actually call.

“Hi!” a cheerful gravely voice rang out on my laptop speakers. “I’m one of the few people I know who still drinks tonic.” (My colleague Rob DeCola, who made this all possible by lending his North Reading accent to our Boston Globe accent tip line, tells me that “tonic” is what old school Mass. natives call “soda.”)

“When I was in the Navy 60-odd years ago … my shipmates made fun of my accent, and I tried to lose it,” recalled McDonough, who grew up in various Boston suburbs before taking up residence in North Weymouth for 43 years. “After I got out and came back home, I realized my accent was a treasure.”

Reader, my battered heart melted.

It liquified further as more voicemails streamed in, nearly 50 in all, from as far away as California and Florida. The theme of almost all these messages was intense affection and pride for their accents.

“ It’s sad to think that the Boston accent is disappearing. It’s like a warm Dunkin’ regular on a wicked cold day,” shared one reader. “Go Sox!”

A former Children’s Hospital nurse shared how a colleague once told her that every time she opened her mouth, she “sounded stupid.” She then told him that every time he opened his mouth, “he sounded like he was from New York, which was worse.” (Caller, I think we could be great friends.)

“I love my accent,” the retired nurse continued. “My father was a firefighter in Boston. My mother grew up in Roxbury. We all had Boston accents.”

Listening to these funny and moving messages, I understood better that the Boston accent is a symbol of family connection, a sense of identity and tied to place, a community. “If you put me in a room with kids I grew up with, it comes back instantly,” noted one reader.

Losing that generational link makes some native speakers sad. “It literally kills me,” mourned Katherine Loftus, the proud daughter of a Southie resident featured in Beth’s story, as she considered her kids lacking her distinctive R-less dialect.

Boston-born Stephanie McCloud connected her beloved accent to a broader regional ethos. “I love it, and I’m very proud of our take-no-prisoners type of attitude, and strong New Englanders who say what we think … but whenever we are friends, we’re friends for life.”

To someone like me, who moved four times by the time I was 14, that sort of geographic identity is downright alien.

I felt delight listening to these voicemails, waking up and listening to them immediately and sharing the best quotes with my colleagues. A reader named Leslie shared that once in Florida, “the girl behind the countah” asked her what country she was from. She loved it.

Frankly, this I’m-gonna-tell-you-exactly-what-I-think and be-exactly-who-I-am attitude is a balm in these confusing times.

So consider this my love letter to Greater Bostonians, with or without accents. I may not be one of you by birth, but I am in spirit, and the way my 8-year-old pronounces “mirrah” proves it.

Let me leave you with a few lines of the poem by Daria, a Roxbury native who wanted to correct those who “think there are no African Americans with Boston accents.”

Out of bed at half past six

grab onto your Dunkin’ fix.

Check the piggybank for quarters,

drive the rotary like martyrs.

We’ll ask about your mother.

Don’t start about your brother.

To hear Daria recite her whole poem in her beautiful accent, along with a selection of other voicemails we received, check out our collection here.

And I’ll keep checking the voicemail — (617) 798-0874 — to see if any of you share more anecdotes.

Read: How much longer will the music of the Boston accent linger?

🧩 1 Down: Actor Pitt | ❄️ 38° Wintry mess

Olympics: Megan Keller is the overtime hero as Team USA came from behind to beat Canada for gold in women’s hockey. Plus, Alysa Liu’s stunning free skate brought her a figure skating gold. And here’s today’s Olympics primer.

Detaining a pregnant women: Defying ICE protocols, a woman 24 weeks into her term was detained in Burlington — and rushed to the hospital when she fell ill.

RIP Eric Dane: The “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Euphoria” star became an advocate for ALS awareness after he was diagnosed. He was 53.

Why so expensive? Boston’s White Stadium overhaul is set to cost $325 million. That’s way more than similar stadium projects in other cities.

‘Excruciating Pain’: ART has been sued by a Black actor who alleges the theater caused lasting damage to her hair,

Firing on one engine: With two of the state’s three big job sectors sputtering, Massachusetts is uncomfortably dependent on healthcare to keep its economy going. Plus, these high school juniors are cramming for their first health care certifications.

‘Teetering’: A temporary funding fix resolved the state’s legal system disaster last summer. But the crisis isn’t over, advocates say. Those funds run out at the end of March.

Backpedaling: After howls of outrage from cyclists, New Hampshire lawmakers killed a proposal to charge an annual fee to bicycle owners. Also rejected: A N.H. proposal to eliminate all childhood vaccine requirements.

Wrong body: A Rhode Island hospital sent remains to a funeral home, but it was not of the 75-year-old woman whom the undertakers said they had buried, a lawsuit alleges.

By David Beard

📺 What to stream this weekend? Beyond the Olympics and the latest “Thrones” finales, we recommend Jennifer Garner’s mystery thriller, a new “Predator,” and the unexpectedly lovely Brendan Fraser movie “Rental Family.”

🍿 Ah, c’mon! You know which Olympics-themed movie that Globe readers would choose as the very best of them all. And voila! Here it is.

🍗 ‘Advanced stupidity’: Can’t Boston have fried chicken fingers without a lawsuit? Shirley Leung says the dispute between Raising Cane and its landlord is about more than how the chicken smells.

🏠 Home of the Week: Like Maine? Water views? A roof deck with irrigated grass? This $3 million glass penthouse in the heart of Portland is the most expensive condo in the city.

💗 Blind date: “I thought he looked sweet and shy, kind of like Harry Potter in ‘Goblet of Fire.’” Plus: “Skincare in a can”: How sardines became Gen Z’s go-to staple.

💔 How do you accept misfortune? It took a year for this grief-stricken writer to comprehend how she’d changed from the tough cards she had been dealt.

⚽ Ryan Reynolds: Fans know he bought a down-and-out Welsh soccer team and it turned around. So has the town of Wrexham, which is now a tourist destination.

Thanks for reading Starting Point.

This newsletter was edited by David Beard and produced by Ryan Orlecki.

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Victoria McGrane can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her @vgmac.