It's only usless 'til you use it

From The Hammond Times Newspaper

A word (a day) to the not-so-wise

This story ran on nwitimes.com on Sunday, January 19, 2003 12:22 AM CST
GREEK TO ME with Michael Raysses

Come the new year, a man's thoughts turn to, well, the new year. Thus, the calendar that I buy to mark time's passage is important to me, beyond making sure I am aware of the date. My calendar must reflect who I am and my relationship to time. (I know you're thinking: "Hey, Mike, it's just a calendar!")

But nothing is as easy as it used to be, so the prospect of picking out a calendar looms large. I don't want just a calendar on the wall above my desk; that would be too impersonal. I want something that climbs down off the wall, sits itself down next to my computer and communicates with me directly. I want a daily calendar; the kind I used to see in old movies -- pages flying off in a mad whirl to indicate the passage of time. Daily calendars, however, aren't what they used to be.

A trip to the bookstore revealed numerous daily calendars, each one dedicated to a specific topic or motif. There were daily calendars for the Civil War, ones with daily Bible quotes. Some were humorous ("The 365 Stupidest Things Ever Said"), while others were more topical. There was an entire calendar dedicated to quotes from our current president titled "They Misunderestimated Me." Sometimes daily calendars overlap, and the good money says that of the aforementioned 365 stupidest things ever said, George W. is good for at least three solid months.

There also are daily calendars that seek to inspire ("Achieve Your Daily Dreams"), as well as those that prey on our deepest fears ("The Worst Case Scenario Daily Calendar"). And just when I had an idea for the perfect hybrid daily calendar for a dysfunctional society ("Achieve Your Daily Worst Case Scenario"), I saw my future, or at least the next 365 days worth in "All in a Word-a-Day" calendar.

"A Word-a-Day" calendar defines a different word for you every day. The good ones give you some insight into the roots of the word, how it evolved and its various uses. Being a writer, you'd think that would be a natural choice. But it runs much deeper than that.

As a kid, I read Marvel comic books. And although Captain America and Spider-Man captivated me, the superhero I most identified with was one of the original X-Men. His name was Beast. Now Beast was short and solid and strong, but the thing that drew me to him was the way he spoke. He had this amazing vocabulary. He would say things like "My pedal extremities are humongous." (Translation: I have big feet.) And though it meant he was on a different wavelength from those around him, it also distinguished him.

So deep was my connection to Beast that I took to talking like him for a while. It wasn't long before my third-grade teacher was sending notes home to my mom, asking her where I was learning so many words that no one else seemed to know the meaning of. And what trauma had I suffered that I was speaking so affectedly?

Years after I quit reading comic books, my dad was working around the house one day. He had his toolbox out; in it was a huge set of socket wrenches of all sizes. I pulled an odd-sized one out and asked him why he owned it. What purpose could a 13/16th-inch socket ever serve? He said something that stuck with me: He told me that particular socket was useless until the moment when he needed it. Then it became invaluable.

From that day on, that's how I saw words -- like sockets for a wrench. And I wanted a socket for every possible occasion. Nothing feels as good as wanting to describe something, to capture its essence, then to reach into some dark corner of your mind and pull out a word, clamp it onto the page, knowing you've achieved a snug fit.

There is one danger in conducting a love affair with words: Your affinity for them may blind you when it comes to using them effectively. And that in a feverish frisson, you will slather your writing with luxuriant terms and expressions, committing solecism after solecism, inviting jeremiads from those unwilling to overlook your literary peccadilloes. The underlying ratiocinations for this will forever remain a mystery to me. (Translation: A word a day can lead a writer astray, which isn't Greek to me.)

E-mail Michael Raysses at Majikrat@Earthlink.net.