(with apologies)
A Solitary Word
I have always wondered: if a person only had or only knew how to spell one word, would that even be possible? And while I wondered about this, I could recall seeing hundreds of scenes that I have personally witnessed in which, even before a baby had become a true language-learner, I could see words entering into that little one's wide-opened eyes. I have a 'for years' collection of such sightings: a father or mother mooning their face into the orbital space of the baby's out-of-focused exosphere. I have always enjoyed seeing the baby’s face glow and then their toothless rims show as they created the smallest miracle. In these endearing repartees ‘I saw the light’…of words.
Babies for certain don’t know the names or the meanings of these words, yet words indeed pass back and forth along the invisible beams which we humans use in sharing our love-joys. Or is it just my imagination: that babies somehow know meanings of words that aren't words yet, and know meanings about meanings which have not been explained to them. And yet, and still, these ‘children of man’ quickly grow— like the big bang—their own worlds from essentially nothing; wherein thoughts and meanings somehow deliver a memorandum of understanding about a university of understanding that has no known address. The results being labeled and commented on by wise grandparents as: the plumbing, and how it always works.
I guess the wonderment above is a try at giving an answer to why I (and humans) write. But the question that comes often to me is: why do you write so much? In this Morning Paper I want to give a short answer to this very preponderant question.
And The Being Goes On
Over these 'years' of observing these miracle-movies and their happy co-stars, I have seen both adult and baby magically pull a word right out of a word, and then deftly pull another one right out of the same word. And so the 'being goes on'; the learning extends. Long before they can spell a word, these young mind-learners advance exponentially. There seems to be many more volumes of word-play going on in these unsaid sessions than there are in those which are read by the infant from a page. Tons of internet, electron transactions—and quite literally: even before there was even an internet.
This ability to catch and hold unspelled words is a great example of how intricately the Maths of Life are built into us; so deeply framed are they that right out of the bun, with hardly a thought, the soul just silently scoops up a googol of words as effortlessly as the skin loves and synergizes with the speeds of sunlight. All the while the life of the child handsomely becomes more and more meaningful. This is man's indomitable powerhouse of learning in action; this, the whole prime directive—written or unwritten—which ineffably charges us.
More New Words, Sarge!
We can always see this conduit of life in use, no matter what the academic grade or the season—summer or fall, running or jumping, humans are always pulling up these live rabbits. As it is, we all perform this habit of life. This meaningful flow expelliates in every game we invent as children, and in every friendship we interact in. These intense numerical sentences always seem to self-magically laugh their way out of us. This truth underscores the maxim which I have always told my youth: 'The more words you know, the more meaningful the life.'
To illustrate some of this, let’s say: if a person enjoys the use and understands the nuances of slang—I mean, really enjoys it to the height that academia enjoys it; might that one also enjoy Chinese, French, Spanish, and all the other languages to a similar level? All communication has meanings and sentiments, nuances and glidings-of-good in their symbolisms. We can find worlds and fascinations to explore among all systems of culture; and there, in the multitude of this cultural counsel, is where safety, and salvation too, can be found.
Our Three Pound Jelly Farms
If we look into history, we will see that humans since 'the dawn of the first evening' have been writing and talking and using words; interfacing with all the lovely components of our planet. And as significant as this splendor is alone, is it any wonder why we just can't stop adding words and meanings to our brain? Why do we press so hard to cram just a few more peta-flops of data into our three pound jelly-farms—and for what: a rainy day? A few more ‘Oh, wows’? A few more useful tools to innovate the next tech wave?
You’ve seen them, I’ve seen them: the aired commercials in which they show couch-cohorts, eye-glued to the game, looking avariciously for that next new word—which they know is coming—in the next pass play. It just doesn't seem possible for them to tear their attention from that un-square, massive LED light, because, with their own person, they just have to see the new move that their guy will say with his incredible, impressive arms and hands. They just believe in his consistent potential to stretch over or under any pass-play conflagration, and thus create another dazzling, new numerical we call a reception. This is what is so amazing about all of the 7,200 kinds of mathematical work that a human can do.
So, as they google-in with their two built-in scanners to closely follow the play, right before their senses it happens: a new word is spelled out—seen by millions, but understood by few. In the weeks afterward, they will no doubt find their mind returning to dissect that numerical sentence. From our own experience we can see why this new set of meanings is so highly treasured, for these phenomena mirror exactly the early getting-of-a-life we experienced as animated infants.
As these cohorts review and analyze this new packet of peta-pieces and enjoy the thrills within its several meanings, they are still frozen in a shock of it all. By their guy’s seemingly impossible move, their minds have just been smacked by a new formation of prime data. In that one moment they have been blessed with more meanings than they had the day before—heavier meanings, and even heavier words. This elation tsunami can only exist, however, because they saw the word forming with their own eyes, and then wrote it indelibly to the more than 90 different locations in the grey matter of their cerebral notepaper. And just as it is common to modern man, someone or something will always remind them of that game, and without thinking, out will come their own hands and arms moving in perfect, but slow formation, to re-spell —just as any young child would—the wonder of that enjoyable new word.
Why Do I Write So Much?
Without doubt I know I have elucidated on things the reader already knows, or has enjoyed the copyright and fair use of for twenty, thirty, or fifty years. The question is still outstanding however: Why do I write so much…well, why do athletes athlete so much? The answer is: because they draw life from their words. The more words one knows, the more words one lives with. Thinking back on the themes above, the maxim could be rephrased: the more words a child learns, or the more word-tools they pick up in their travels, the more weapons they have to survive their game of life.
For me then, writing is so much a part of living, and the longer I live (truly live), the more writing I am willingly impelled to do. I find so many excelling things to write about: items of the past which I've heard about, or all the news in the present that I can Google. I want my readers to 'read all about it', so to speak, long before their own future numericals arrive. I want people to see me (their guy) invent a new word, and then see that word eventually come into good use by fans. It is my 'boldly-going' trek to write words that belong to all the PhD's in existence. By so doing, it is my hope to expose fresh knowledge concerning this ‘so great deal’ that our birth-bodies have been thrust through into, and shout-out as best I can about the fevered word-quest involved with keeping that well-baby well-adorned with righteousness.
To Live More Abundantly...
So the reason I write so much at this present time is because I live so much at this time, and because I know more mores, I have so much more to live with. I now collect words and their meanings at such a pace that their aggregate of interconnections affords wealth of a most active kind, and the fissionable evaluation of the numerical elements—even before they get on page—results in a rejoicing on the order of E = MC2.
We had a saying at Jason Lee Middle School for our students regarding honoring good deeds done among their fellows: If you see something newsworthy, say something. As I still follow that design in my daily writing discipline, I see to it that whenever I get a new word, I say a new word—and its meanings. In truth, we would all write more if drawing life from words became an expected occurrence from all civilized language-learners.