#451 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Thursday September 8)
Credit: redbubble.com
Good morning,
A potpourri of ramblings today…
“The disorienting thing about getting older that nobody tells you about is about how weird it feels to get a really passionate, extremely wrong lecture from a much younger person about verifiable historical events you can personally remember pretty well.” –Brittany Wilson
SAYING IT SIMPLY—THE GRAMMAR AND STYLE CORNER
We overuse some words because they sound better. My pet peeve here is “going further,” when people mean “going farther” (as in “farther down the road”). I think they use “further” simply because it sounds more sophisticated than “farther.” These are, of course, completely different words, with completely different meanings. Further is a measure of degree, e.g., “the professor confused the students even further when she started a discourse on grammar.” Farther is a measure of distance, e.g., “the student ran farther down the road when he espied the professor.”
SIMPLER WORDS ARE BETTER
Just as simple declarative sentences are better than long compound sentences weighted down with adjectives and adverbs, a simple word should always be preferred over what sounds better but is only unnecessarily unwieldy.
The Wall Street Journal “Style and Substance” column noted last August that a word that often is used because it sounds great, when other words would suffice, is “multiple”:
“Was more than one mistake made by someone? Aha, there were MULTIPLE mistakes! Did someone observe something fishy happening more than once? Aha, there were MULTIPLE instances. Did more than one person accuse someone? There were MULTIPLE accusers!
“Writers sound like police captains reading an arrest blotter when we reach for the word…we can sound as if we are pumping up the drama, which is never a good thing. Typically, several, many or (if it applies) numerous would do fine. Or sometimes, no adjective at all. In other cases, more than once. Even better…would be to actually say what we mean (12 times? Six instances?).”
“…Grant McCracken, an anthropologist and author, weighed in on this in an essay in 2009…’Somehow, while we were not really paying attention, ‘multiple’ stole into our language and displaced ‘several’ in a bloodless coup...’”
“In any case, using a fancy word is never better than a shorter equivalent. In that light, we still sometimes write the fake-fancy incentivize when we just mean encourage, and as well as the dreaded utilize instead of use. No need to dress things up.”
IN PRAISE OF AMBIENT NOISE
While I definitely had my late nights in the law library, in law school I sought out more crowded public places to do much of my studying. Indeed, some of my best work was done writing outlines with a classmate over dinner and at Joe Allen’s restaurant. Once I went out in the working world, I have gravitated toward cafes or coffee shops, where I was able to do work without the intrusion of colleagues and phone calls. Once our computers became mobile, I would visit these places with my laptop, responding to emails and writing correspondence. Ambient noise, the hustle-bustle of other people, and the occasional distractions are things I look for, perhaps to make my work life seem more regular and part of the greater world.
When the COVID isolation began in March 2020, many of us had to find alternative spaces in our homes within which to work. Some went for the backyard. Those with the benefit of a spare room or office could opt for peace and quiet that option offered (Andrea opted for that). Others still could be found on a Zoom call in their bedroom. Those with young children were forced to find bits of peace and quiet wherever the kids let them. I opted for the dining room table, in the center of the house. Andrea thinks I’m nuts (and sometimes thinks I’m in the way), but I like the activity around me.
I’m okay with the dog pestering me, the doorbell ringing, the arrival of packages, and people coming and going. I’m not quite sure what this all means, but activity around me is what I enjoy. Perhaps in the absence of the daily actions and interactions in a busy office, with its distractions, I seek out the intrusion of distractions that actually make my time more productive.
PERSPECTIVE
In rewatching the movie Slow West (and I recommend it highly), I was particularly moved by the following line: “Before too long, this will be a long time ago.” Food for thought. We are living what will be, before too long, history. Eventually, we will be the ones in the old photos in the attic.
Have a great day,
Glenn
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