A WORD ABOUT WORDS

 

I love words!  I fell in love with them from the moment I learned to read, “Run, Dick, run!  Run, Jane, run.”  Oh, how I loved DICK AND JANE and my first grade teacher who taught me to read...Miss Roberta Champion.

I love to read words...I love to write words...I love to learn new and interesting words.  And one of my favorite parts of learning Language Arts in school was FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE.  Remember:  hyperbole, similes, metaphor, and (the really weird one) onomatopoeia....and yes, I had to look up how to spell that one!!! 

 

Today, however, I learned a new one...I had never heard this word before...

PARAPROSDOKIAN

 

In case it’s new for you too, here is the definition:

 

figure of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected. 

 

They are often humorous and so are popular among comedians.  From what I’ve read, Winston Churchill was a huge fan and often came up with some of his own.

MAXINE is a great example...who doesn't love Maxine???

 

For your entertainment, I present just a few more...

 

*Where there’s a will, I want to be in it.

*I used to be indecisive, but now I’m not so sure.

*Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian anymore than standing in a garage makes you a car.       (so true!!)

*Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.  Wisdom is not using one in a fruit salad. 

*I’m supposed to respect my elders, but it’s getting harder and harder for me to find one.     (I’m beginning to understand this!!!) 

*If I agreed with you, we’d both be wrong.

 

 

Another figure of speech I have always liked are...

 

OXYMORONS

 

An oxymoron is a figure of speech which contains words that seem contradictory to one another. This incongruity can be accidental or deliberate, as in cases of humor.

 

* Of course I can keep secrets. It’s the people I tell them to that can’t keep them. - Anthony Haden-Guest

* You'd be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap. - Dolly Parton

 

* I distinctly remember forgetting that. - Clara Barton   (I can definitely identify with this one!)

* I can resist everything but temptation. - Oscar Wilde

 

WORDS, WORDS, WORDS...oh how I love words.

In a TED presentation titled THE GIFT OF WORDS, Javed Akhtar talked about “words as magical tools that carry meaning.”  He also talked about how we seem to be losing our power to use words....often using “emojis” or abbreviations for words...

         IDK – I don’t know

         TYVM – Thank you very much

         OMG – Oh my goodness

Akhtar even suggested that we may lose some of our vocabulary altogether.

         “(Words) reflect your culture, your traditions, your inheritance, your cultural wealth accumulated over generations, all of that is carried forward with words. If you cut a man off from some words, you cut him off from a culture, a history. This is exactly what is happening with us today“.

 

I love to see words, I love to hear words, I love to write words...but sadly we are losing at least to some degree our ability to communicate.  How often have you been to a restaurant recently and watched as couples sat texting on their phones rather than talking with their spouse or date or whomever they were with?  Just so sad.

I pray I never lose my love of words and that all of us never forget the power of both the spoken and written word.

WORDS HAVE POWER.

THE RIGHT WORDS CAN MAKE ALL THE DIFFERENCE.