SATs, anyone?
After almost 29 years of marriage, last Friday night, Husband #1 and I had to look up our first word in the dictionary. It does not matter what the word was, I was just excited about pulling out our Webster’s New 20th Century Unabridged Dictionary. It weighs about 10 pounds, which makes it really hard to lose. I thought I knew what the word meant, and I sort of did, but reading the meaning in the dictionary confused me even more — so not surprising. Husband #1 was fine with my mediocre explanation, and he just stuck with what I told him because, he too, had no idea what the dictionary was saying.
This basically sums up why we are still together after almost 29 years…
It got me thinking about other meaningful words that I have learned throughout my life. The word “corrugated.” It was the very first word I leaned at the Stanley Kaplan SAT prep course that my parents made me take. As I recall, we would sit in a classroom, wearing giant headphones, listening to tapes teach us about the different sections of the test. Ahh, now those are memorable times. It is hard to take a good nap when you fall asleep on one of those headphones. Man, did my parents waste money on me.
Truth is, we paid for ACT and SAT prep for our boys and we are currently seeing how well that all turned out, thank God. Again, as parents, you have no idea what you are doing, and tutoring your kids for tests that will help them get into college never seems like a bad idea. How are you to know that they will decide not to go to college? How? No, really, I am asking you how???
The next word that has special meaning to me is the word “rue.” He will rue the day he runs into me at the supermarket! I got this word wrong on the PSAT, and my dear little brother proceeded to show me a Garfield cartoon with the word “rue” in it. I have never forgotten its meaning since. Thank you, brother.
And then we have the word “bombastic,” which means egotistical, arrogant. When I was a freshman in Frisch, yes, there was a Frisch High School in the olden times, I had a crush on a boy. This was such a crush that I put an anonymous note in his locker. The note read, “Dear so and so: I think that you are really cute. Love, anonymous.” Yes, I was nuts even in high school, at the young age of 14 and 3/4.
It became a joke with the boy, with me, with my friends. My good friend in high school was a girl named Annie, who was also my good friend in elementary school. Don’t worry, my track record it still intact, and we are no longer good friends. That is mainly because she never responds to any of my messages, but I don’t know if she does that to other people. Anyway, it doesn’t really matter in this particular story. Annie was always on my side. One afternoon, she came up with a list of words describing the boy who didn’t return my crush. (He finally did return it, but it was a few years later, and I had moved on… I know, I am such a heartbreaker. Big girls need love too, you know.) Back to the story.
The first word was bombastic. So-and-so is so bombastic — that is why he doesn’t like you. Yes, that must be it. I hadn’t heard that word in decades until the other day, I was watching a movie, and a character called the other character “bombastic” and I am telling you it took me back to the Frisch girls locker room where Annie was writing these words down. Now that is a really good friend.
The words that are new but have become more common as of late have been words like “shtark.” “My son is very shtark.” Or “geshmak.” “It is geshmak to be a Yid.” We can say “Yid” is a new word too. What is the point here? Well, I guess it is that just like certain smells (Drakkar) and certain music (anything from the ’80s) can evoke some really amazing or really painful memories, words have that power as well. And there you go.
Banji Ganchrow of Teaneck did pretty well on her SATS, which is reflected in the pretty good life that she has now., Baruch Hashem. No, I do not believe that one thing has absolutely ANYTHING to do with the other thing!!!!!!!
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