Saying “Goodbwyes”

by David Wesley

“Why can’t we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn’t work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos.” – Charles M. Schulz


For those who are in the NTS initiative called 365m and are preparing to leave the U.S. to Brazil, Croatia and Ireland for a year of internship, language learning, culture learning and many other things, this month is a time of saying “goodbye” to family and friends for a year or two years in some cases. I don’t know about you, but I have had more than my share of saying “goodbye” and I do not particularly like it.

The history of “goodbye,” according to Answers.com (by the way, I’m not at all sure how accurate Answers.com really is, but I’m going to take its word on this one):
No doubt more than one reader has wondered exactly how goodbye is derived from the phrase “God be with you.” To understand this, it is helpful to see earlier forms of the expression, such as God be wy you, god b’w'y, godbwye, god buy’ ye, and good-b’wy. The first word of the expression is now good and not God, for good replaced God by analogy with such expressions as good day, perhaps after people no longer had a clear idea of the original sense of the expression. A letter of 1573 written by Gabriel Harvey contains the first recorded use of goodbye: “To requite your gallonde [gallon] of godbwyes, I regive you a pottle of howdyes,” recalling another contraction that is still used.

As you leave friends and family, I trust that you will trust that God will be with them and will also be with you. The good thing about this process is that for every “Goodbwyes” that you say, you will soon be saying hundreds of “howdyes” in Brazil, Croatia and Ireland.