An Ode to the Dictionary

If you were to ask me what the best birthday present is that I've ever received, I would tell you without hesitation that the Merriam-Webster's collegiate dictionary from my best friend Phil and his fiancee (at the time), Jenn, was one of the best (if not the best) birthday present I have ever received. "A dictionary?" you ask. Yes, a dictionary.

It all started in the seventh grade when I was herded into the "regular" english class with all of the other students suffering from literary dificiencies. I was never good at writing or vocabulary and I honestly don't remember ever liking English, but after spending some time in class, I felt like I needed more of a challenge. I had my mom talk to the "system" and she managed to get me bumped to the honors class despite my repugnant scores on the English portion of the state exams. I loved my new class and I really started to love words.

In high school, I managed to get a hold of an old collegiate dictionary and would refer to it often at home. I'm guessing that is what gave Phil the first clue. That, and the fact that my dictionary was missing about three pages in the "M" section (drove me crazy).

I bring all of this up because a series of recent events has caused me to think about that dictionary and dictionaries in general. Call it an ode to the dictionary, if you will.

Event #1: The other day I was trying to describe how I felt to a friend and I couldn't come up with the right word. I was hungry, but I wasn't full-blown hungry, I was inbetween slightly and moderately hungry and for the life of me, I couldn't come up with the right descriptive word. It was then that I decided I needed a reverse dictionary. So instead of wondering about a word for a while, I would simply pull up the "I" section and find the reverse definition of "inbetween slightly and moderately."

Event #2: Yesterday morning I opened up my closet to find a slow drip, drip of water from the upstairs toilet conveniently leaking on my favorite suit. I hurried and moved the suit out of the flow along with all of my other clothes in jeopardy of being soiled, but my major concern wasn't saving my clothes, it was finding the right word to describe the water that had a very unpleasant smell. I kept thinking of the word "fetid." I had a somewhat flimsy grasp of its meaning but didn't know for sure until I looked it up later that night in my collegiate dictionary and realized it meant "having a heavy offensive smell."

Event #3: Perhaps spurred by all of the dictionary happenings of the previous days, my dream last night involved a dictionary. It just so happened that in this dream of mine, I dropped my favorite birthday present into the toilet on accident. I was devastated to say the least and I was frantically trying to dry it off without completely ruining it. I'm pretty sure it could have been described as fetid at that point.

I know, I know, a little boring, right? But as a PR person, I love words, I love to write and I love to peruse the dictionary.