And 2012's Guiding Word Is...

I really and truly dislike December every year. It would be a perfectly good month if it weren't infected throughout by Christmas, the pressure of the annual New Year's milestone, and my damnable birthday. All three must happen, though, every year, but this year I made the bold decision to take it in stride, aside from some complaining on Twitter, of course. I have to remain true to myself.



I decided that, while taking this whole end-of-the-year avalanche of milestones and meaningfulness in stride, I would go one step further and create my own little meaningful piece of it as a way to claim some of this for my own. Plus, winter is long and hard in Saskatchewan, and I need for things to suck less.

After giving it a bit of thought, I decided that the little meaningful piece I created for myself would be this: I would choose one word to use as a guide through 2012.

While I was thinking about what my word would be, I asked the people of Twitter what their words would be, and I received a number of answers: fun, joy, money, healthy, open, persistence, investment, dare, less, completion, wholehearted, patience, believe, tenacious, rehearse, onward, peace, fearless, tend, love, mindfulness, perspective, and acceptance. I also found out that Ali Edwards had already had the same idea with One Little Word 2012. I took this as a sign that it was a good idea to be having.

One word kept coming back to me, and I didn't like it, because it wasn't a particularly emotional or inspired sounding word, and it lacked a certain sexiness, but there it was, creeping back in among the much more interesting words I was trying to push it out with.

shift
verb (used without object)

5. to move from one place, position, direction, etc., to another.
6. to manage to get along or succeed by oneself.

See? "Shift" does not score very high on the sexy meter, but it's a pushy little syllable, so there it is.

2012's "shift" is going to help me to remain mindful of when I need to shift in direction either in thought or in action. "Shift" will be my reminder to sidestep complacency and change paths when I feel stuck. "Shift" will help me to keep moving rather than allow myself to become mired in self-doubt and the safety of repetition.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that "shift" is already in action.

If you were to have a word to help guide you through 2012, what would it be? Are you surprised by what comes up for you?

Words Can Make You Fat

I found myself repeating the following words like some kind of mantra, because I enjoyed the way they felt rolling around in my mouth:

peanut butter spread
on thick
buttered
bread.

And so, let me introduce you to what ended up being my second breakfast this morning:



Burp.

The Torture Of Attaining "Beauty", News, Personal Ads, The Shaggs, Half Of A Rhyme, Icky Words, And The Penny

“Their legs encased in protective plaster shielding wobbly bones impaled by a medieval-style metal brace, a group of young Chinese women sit smiling through their post-surgical pain in an upscale Beijing hospital, content in the belief that they have just received a leg up in loveliness.” Will this madness ever stop? Sometimes I lose hope.

More news is good news.

A perennial fan of personal ads, I think these are way too funny.

Oh, The Shaggs. They were introduced to me by the Fiery One. They are truly awful to listen to, but so much so that they are a gem you should not miss. “My Pal Foot Foot,” the absolute must-hear of the album, lacks rhythm altogether. Even the vocals fall on irregular beats. To quote Susan Orlean: “Is this the colloquial ease and dislocated syntax of a James Schulyer poem or the awkward innermost thoughts of a speechless teen-ager?” A close second is “Who Are Parents” (click on the link to hear the song). You can tell that it was their father who ran the band by the song’s lyrics.
Please don’t hate me because I point out such high-quality music.

I’ve been thinking quite a bit lately about unfinished bits of folklore or wisdom; for example, the rhyme “find a penny, pick it up,and all day long you’ll have good luck.” There is a second half to that rhyme that goes “find a penny, leave it lay, and you will have bad luck all day.” In another variation, it also ends “sixty-three more, I’ll have a cup,” which was new to me. I have been trying to locate the complete poem, because I once read a version that cautioned the finder to also give the penny away, but I have been unable to find it so far. Another example is the saying “curiosity killed the cat.” It has the little-known ending “but satisfaction brought him back,” which completely alters the meaning, although this second half may have been added later on after what was likely the first half’s initial appearance in the early 1900s. Anyway, if anyone knows of the complete penny rhyme, let me know. Have I only imagined it?

Words that I do not like for any number of reasons, be it their sound, lack of visual aesthetic appeal, or counterintuitive spelling (which is not always a bad thing, and in fact quite a good thing at times, but annoying in some cases):
– SPA: 1. A resort providing therapeutic baths 2. A resort area having mineral springs 3. A fashionable hotel or resort 4. A tub for relaxation or invigoration, usually including a device for raising whirlpools in the water.
Some possible origins of the word “spa” are: from the Latin words espa (fountain) and sparsa (from spargere, which means “to bubble up”); sanus per aquam, which means “health by or through water”; solus per aqua, which is Latin for “enter by means of water” or “health through water”; salut per aqua, which is Latin for “health or relaxation through water” and was found in graffiti in Roman baths.
"Spa" is aesthetically pleasing in its visual balance, especially when spelled completely in the lower case, but its sound is unfinished, open-ended, hanging there sickly as though it has lost its wind before being able to complete itself.
– GRAVITAS: 1. Substance; weightiness; “a frivolous biography that lacks the gravitas of its subject” 2. A serious or dignified demeanor; “our national father figure needs gravitas.”
It comes directly from the Latin, gravitas, meaning “heaviness” or “seriousness.”
Detestable. I like its look, and it sounds good when you say it incorrectly, but said correctly, it sounds distinctly like a word used only to impress, as though one should affect an accent of English snobbery to draw out its end. Also, it does not feel like its meaning; it’s sound and look are lighter than the concept trying to be conveyed. Pronouncement: defective and icky.
– ULULATE: To howl, wail, or lament loudly.
It originates imitatively from the Latin ululare.
Part of me wants to love this word. Said loudly and with a bit of a yodel, it expresses its meaning really well, but it seems to want some kind of consonant at its beginning to balance its own weight on the other end. Read silently or yodelled exceptionally loudly, this word is fine, but it should never be used in a regular, spoken sentence.

Penny Facts and Links:
* It was on April 14th, 1871 that the Canadian government, through the Uniform Currency Act, set denominations of currency as dollars, cents, and mills.
* The first Canadian postage stamp was known as the "Three Penny Beaver," which is one of the world’s earliest examples of a pictorial stamp, as opposed to the customary political portrait, coat-of-arms, or geometric design.
* The modern one-cent piece in Canada shows two maple leaves on a common twig, which is a design that has gone almost unchanged since 1937.
* Here is good, albeit brief, history of the penny.
* In 1652, the first coffeehouse opened in England. They became known as “penny universities,” because a penny was the price of admission and a cup of coffee.
* And, last but not least, Wikipedia has this to say on the matter.

Volunteering, Weddings, A Wet-Sounding Word, A Good Blog, And Nightcrawler

I’ve managed to get myself entangled in organizing our regional book awards brunch, and without thinking, I volunteered myself to do one of the bigger jobs – I have to arrange seating, food, and general set-up for 200 guests. Yikes! I’ve never done anything like this before, and if I’m not careful, my little perfectionist self just might want to implode. I’m sure the whole affair will end up working out quite well, but knowing that doesn’t stop me from imagining mass food poisoning, or at least having the master of ceremonies getting up to find no microphone or podium at which to speak.

On Saturday night, the Fiery One and I went to a wedding. It was tacky as hell, and so wonderful. I never used to care much for weddings until I had one, and now it’s all very touching to see two people who actually like each other and get along make it legal. Despite the duke-em-out fight between the nearly married couple and a guy in a gorilla suit and a man in conservative clothes representing the moral majority, there was a sense of sincerity that you rarely experience most days (or weeks, or months). And since I eat that sort of thing up like butterscotch pudding, I drank too many rye-and-cokes and stared at the Fiery One all mushy-like throughout the evening and rubbed up against him on the dance floor in such a way that, if I wasn’t the woman he’s married to, would make me look like a two-bit whore. Ah, weddings.

Clatch. Cf. Scot. clatch a slap, the noise caused by the collision of soft bodies; prob. of imitative origin.] (Scot. & Dial. Eng.) (n.) A soft or sloppy lump or mass; as, to throw a clatch of mud. (n.) Anything put together or made in a careless or slipshod way; hence, a sluttish or slipshod woman. (v. t. & i.) To daub or smear, as with lime; to make or finish in a slipshod way.
I realized quickly that this was not the word I was looking for. “A soft or sloppy lump or mass” was not exactly the sort of word I was looking for to describe a certain group of ladies, although in my present mood, it almost seems fitting for how I feel about them. What I really meant was this word, which is not often used anymore:
Klatch (n.) A social gathering devoted primarily to small talk and gossip.
Etymologically it is derived from the German Klatsch, from klatschen, which means to gossip, or make a sharp noise, and is of imitative origin. The earliest date known for the usage of this word may be only as early as 1885, but possibly as late as 1941. Klatch keeps running through my head lately, because it has such a sound to it, like the slapping of wet skin. Klatch klatch klatch klatch klatch. Even better is Kaffeeklatsch. Cluck cluck.

I know that I have a permanent link to ftrain’s weblog, but this one is particularly good, so I thought I would draw more attention to it.

A dear friend of mine, Nightcrawler, moved very far away from me, and has since expanded the reach of and devoted her life to varying forms of performance. Here is an excerpt I found about her latest spectacle:
Nightcrawler’s untitled performance addresses racism operating at the level of the body and hygiene. Since the era of first contact, the so-called “odour of the other” has served as a pernicious means by which European colonizers stigmatized First Nations peoples. Reflecting at the edge of a fountain in Berczy Park, Nightcrawler recalls an episode in the life of Quannah Parker, the last chief of the Comanches, who once caused a stir by bathing in a public fountain. The artist will satirically confront the misconceived but persistent fiction of “cultural stench.”
I must add that her public fountain-bathing also included her own brand of opera. Her humour is razor-sharp and bubbling, a bit of the clowning that haunted our childhood nightmares admixed with mature exploration and the joy of expression. How fabulous to make a bit of a living doing the things that few of us ever have the courage to commit. I had to write this little blurb about her, because I’m hoping she’ll read it and be tickled, and also because I want her to be absolutely famous one day.

Saulteaux First Nations Facts and Links:
* The Saulteaux have a whopping fifteen reserves in Saskatchewan!
* The word "Chief" in Saulteaux is "Ogima-kan". Ogima literally translated into English means "somebody higher up", but is more adequately translated as "Boss". Kan translated means "the position"; therefor Ogima-kan means "the position of boss".
* This link offers a much more comprehensive overview of the traditional Saulteaux world view and beliefs than I will bother to type out.
* Amuse yourself with trying to sound out some common terms and phrases in the Saulteaux language.
* A little extra information in brief.