Confessions of a Logophile

If you were told to draw a sun in elementary school, there was really only one default way to go about it. After choosing a yellow crayon, you would draw a single arc in the corner of a blank piece of paper. And there you have it—a sun. Simple. Default. Uniform. A bird, instead of having feathers and beaks and claws, became a squiggle of what looked like two half-circles stuck together. Drawing a landscape of grass became a single line of green across the page. In an elementary schooler’s eyes, everything is two-dimensional. As you grow older, however, things start to look different. Perspective develops as we graduate from two-dimensional shapes to three-dimensional figures. Now, you are no longer allowed to hide behind simplicity. When asked to draw a simple landscape now, many of us would opt to make more complex drawings, because we have all developed a unique way of processing our surroundings. There are no longer the same mandatory components that we have to check off: A sun, gra...

Humor is interesting in the sense that jokes are only funny to laugh at it in the moment— but when talked about, they don’t hold the same weight. Which is what makes funny people so interesting. How does someone master the art of making the perfect quip or connecting the right concepts in a matter of seconds to make someone laugh? It actually requires an insane amount of intelligence— which is the same reason that most of the writers on ‘The Office’ are Ivy League graduates . You may not think that a lot goes into being funny, but being funny requires a layered understanding of your audience’s social structure, divergent thinking, and recognizing intricate patterns in language and behavior. If you consider yourself a funny person, you probably don’t think you do all this, but it’s because your brain does it subconsciously. So the next time someone calls you funny, just know that they’re basically calling you a genius.  Article I came across:  https://theconversation.com/funny-...

  Word of the week: Liminal (adj.) - On the border of two things, usually two abstract things.      The usual ambience of an art museum is filled with whispers of “what do you think this one means?” and the weight of the unspoken rule that pieces are solely present to be admired from afar– meaning absolutely no touching. This is told to us by various warning signs and winding black stanchions that are forbidden to cross. Even though art supposedly has no boundaries, there is no room for sticky fingerprints and accidental food stains in the presence of million dollar canvases.       Very rarely, you may stumble upon a piece that requires the participation of onlookers to become a piece of art. One of these few and far between pieces resides in the Art Institute of Chicago, and at first glance, resembles a regular pile of candy.  Something you’d find on discount on a Sunday Costco trip, or a child's halloween spoils. “Untitled (Portrait of Ross...

Word of the week: Psithurism (noun) - The sound of wind blowing through trees and rustling their leaves. Every Saturday morning, when dawn has just begun to show herself and the world takes on a soft, muted quality, I put on my wool socks and my favorite worn hoodie to venture out into the biting air. Right in the middle of my street, there is a secret dirt path that seems to lead straight into thick greenery. Eventually, when the houses fade away, and I'm among the willows and honey locusts, and the light flows through the leaves in a way that makes me thankful that I feel the sun on my face, I am no longer a suburban teenager; but a weathered explorer on a quiet quest for hidden treasure. But truly, real treasure is the feeling my walks evoke within me.

Word of the week: Abecedarian (noun) - A person who is learning the alphabet.  Bet you’ve never heard that word before. Did you know that the average 20 year old American knows around 42,000 words on average ? Okay, that does seem like a lot. But do you know how many words exist in the English language? It’s actually such a vast, ever-changing and expanding amount that no one really knows. Not even experts. So for this blog, every word of the week will eventually connect back to the topic at hand. I was actually originally going to name this blog ‘The Lazy Logophile’, so that should tell you more than enough. But back to the topic at hand… College essays. Squeezing 16 years of life into a 650 word (shoe)box. Every single time I try to sit down and write anything , I find myself second-guessing everything . Could it be better? Cooler? Funnier? Show more of my ‘personality’ (whatever that means)?  It has me feeling much like an abecedarian , in the sense that everywhere I step s...

Wouldn’t be a thank you letter for English without Valentino! To the one and only Ms. Valentino,   Whenever I talk to adults about teachers, they always share the sentiment that there is one teacher from their entire academic career who  “did it”.  And by “ it ”, I mean genuinely change their life for the better. And you, Ms. Valentino, have done it. The love that you have for the English language runs so deep that it was impossible not to get immersed into this way of viewing the world from the very beginning. From finding hidden meanings, to unpacking symbolism, to understanding clever uses of irony and satire, there have been so many laughs, so much learning, and a  lot  of inspiration— and all of the credit goes to you. You may not realize it, but I hope that after reading all of these thank you letters from you students that you understand the profound impact that you’ve had on me and all of the people you have taught in the past. I can’t even put it into w...