I agree with Beth on this one. It's a sign of respect in my book, too, especially when used with sincerity, and having been raised with good manners, it would never occur to me to use those terms in any other way.

As a 44-year-old, I'm often called ma'am, even out here in Southern California, and while reading this thread and reviewing my own use of those terms here, I'm pretty sure I only use them with people older than myself. People who are my peers in age just get a "Pardon me," or "Excuse me." I'd never examined that before reading this thread.

I've also caught myself calling friends of my daughter Darlin' and Sweetheart. Also terms of endearment as these are kids - male and female - who I genuinely like a lot. I've known most of them since they were all in Kindergarten together and they're about to go into 6th grade. Many of them call me Roxy, which I have to admit I found disconcerting at first, but I asked my daughter what she calls their mothers, and she replied with their first names.

Maybe it's an enlightened Southern California thing and I'm still getting used to it, but there you go. I don't think I've ever heard my daughter say "Yes, ma'am" to anyone now that I'm thinking about it. She's very good on the pleases and thank yous, but man, I've got some hometraining to do.

...Okay, so I just went and asked her if she ever uses those terms and she said no. I asked her why not and she sort of chuckled and said, "'Cause it would make me sound like the most polite person in the world." Read that nerdy, I guess. At lease she recognizes the implication of the use of those terms.

Yep, some hometraining is in order, especially before we head to Florida next week to visit my family there.

Roxy