Friday, July 13, 2012

There Are No Words for The Importance of Words


River Unk
River Unk (Photo credit: John Clift)
How did words ever get invented?
Because mothers don't need kids to speak.
Mom's respond will give a kid what he wants when he goes "unk".
"Oh.  He wants milk."
And that's the only word he needs.
"Unk!" - He wants a cookie.
"Unk!" - He is sleepy.
"Unk!" - We don't use that kind of talk!
Then I guess Mom couldn't interpret one.
"Uunk!" - Well, THAT'S a new one!
It's only mothers that can interpret a child's speech.
Dad can't understand it.
Plus, Dad isn't listening.
Unk! Unk! Unk!
"Listen to your child!  He's telling you to mow."
So it was fathers that started insisting there be actual words.

Some people still haven't mastered communication.
"It was big."
How big?
"Probably the size of a dog."
Chihuahuas and Great Danes are both dogs.
"Ok.  The size of an elephant."
No dogs are that big.
"A baby elephant."
"A dog-sized, baby elephant."
Our culture is so visually oriented.
Nobody knows how to write anymore.
We just throw video on YouTube.
If YouTube had been around when Steinbeck was alive...
...The Grapes of Wrath would just be three minutes of crappy home video.
"Let's go to California!"
..."Wow! It's farther than we thought!"
..."Grandma's dead."
..."Watch me eat this spoonful of cinnamon!"
Our radio personalities have video cameras...
So we can watch people talking on the radio!
Authors should do that.
"Have you seen J.K Rowling writing 'Harry Potter'?"
..."It's awesome!"
And the amount of loathing I feel for the word "awesome" is
...awesome.
When you use the same word to describe a skateboard jump
...and a sunset over the ocean
...and the birth of a child
...you might as well drop the word as an adjective.
We should change that word to a proper noun.
"Nice to meet you.  I'm Awesome."
Nice to meet you.  I'm Da Bomb.
I know people who are named that...
Usually they are introduced by someone else.
"That girl's Da Bomb."
I hope I never follow Ms. Bomb through airport security.




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1 comment:

Unknown said...

I always thought awesome should only be used to indicate, you know, some AWE. Sadly, general awareness of the breadth encompassed in said word is somewhat limited. Alas.