Everyday Musings > Running out of words

Ever felt like you were going through something you had to say a whole sentence for, and could never find a word to fit it?

I do, Constantly. And googled extensively to find those words. Found one I’d been wondering about for a while - the smell of wet earth – it’s confined in a very uninspiring ‘Petrichor’.

Douglas Adams in his book ’The meaning of Liff, where Liff is defined as a phenomenon for which there is no word, took the map of the British Isles and used whatever places showed up on it as words to describe things he couldn’t find words for. Like

ABILENE (adj.) Descriptive of the pleasing coolness on the reverse side of the pillow.

GOLANT (adj.) Blank, sly and faintly embarrassed. Pertaining to the expression seen on the face of someone who has clearly forgotten your name.

LUPPITT (n.) The piece of leather which hangs off the bottom of your shoe before you
can be bothered to get it mended.

NEMPNETT THRUBWELL (n.) The feeling experienced when driving off for the first time on a brand new motorbike.

NYBSTER (n.) Sort of person who takes the lift to travel one floor.

OZARK (n.) One who offers to help just after all the work has been done.

POGES (pl.n.) The lumps of dry powder that remain after cooking a packet soup.

QUENBY (n.) A stubborn spot on a window which you spend twenty minutes trying to clean off before discovering it's on the other side of the glass.

SHOEBURYNESS The vague uncomfortable feeling you get when sitting on a seat, which is still warm from somebody else's bottom.

Adams made it seem so easy. No learning Latin and figuring out roots and etymology to come up with words. Recycle. Reuse. Invent. And if it fits, it’s yours. Maybe I could have a dictionary of my own.

I did start one, a long time ago, called Rayirath lexicon. But it had relatable things in it. Like ‘Pisa Effect’ (taking mistakes and turning them into novelty factors), ‘Mistletoe Syndrome’ (doing things because there is a environment conducive to it, like kissing under a mistletoe because tradition says so) and ‘Subtitling the mind’ (when one person puts into words what someone else might be thinking at that time.)

But maybe I could do one with invented words this time. So I set about the task of creating some meanings I needed words for. Here goes…

YAZOO – The feeling of not wanting to come to work today

PREBZLE! – Figuring the perfect wittiest killer of a come back line hours after you’ve lost the argument.

SWULL – When you’re lost in thoughts and don’t realize the light’s turned Green and everyone’s honking behind you.

YEEHAAA – The euphoric feeling just before you walk into your boss’s cabin to hand in your resignation letter.

GLINK - When your eyebrows rise involuntarily seeing a stunning girl/ boy walk up to you.

Figured something in all this. Nothing in this world makes sense by itself. We created everything when we created language. And oddly, we’ve probably become slaves to our creations, believing them to be the ultimate truth, when there’s possibly nothing like that. Even truth, afterall, is just a word.