In a word

What's in a word? What meaning do we attach to words, or do we really attach any meaning at all? In my rose colored version of history, our words meant much more, held more weight. It was a compliment to say that someone was a man 'of his word.' and so much of society was based upon spoken words. But somewhere along the way, we got less formal and now words are just to placate. So much of our conversation is just boiler plate language we have repeated over and over and now it's nearly meaningless. "How are you?" 'Fine, you?" "Me, good. Busy, you know!" Then we have people in public life saying whatever they want to grab a headline with absolutely no consequence. It doesn't matter that these statements are mean spirited, ugly and outright lies. While I am grateful for the chance to be able to express my sentiments and say things to other people that might have been considered inappropriate under Victorian era etiquette, I can't help but think we have swung a little too far in the other direction. We want friends and family to feel nice and happy so we twist things every so slightly to give our excuses (or maybe ourselves) more clout. We say we have plans when we just want to go home and be alone or appointments when it's really just meeting a different friend for coffee or knowingly double-book and then cancel later instead of just saying no. That always acceptable "too busy!" becomes something much closer to 'no.' All of these little, seemingly innocent, not-quite-the-truth-but-not-quite-a-lie statements start to add up, are accepted by all and slowly, but ever so steadily we chip away at the meaning of our words. Soon enough, perhaps now, we don't know what to think as we simply cannot believe what people say. I know it's much worse right now, due to the theatrics, mud-slinging and childish behavior precipitated by the election, but it isn't only mainstream media and political candidates that gloss over the truth. It's all of us, all of the time. I recently read 'Lying' by Sam Harris and was delighted by his insistence that telling the truth matters. Our words matter. This is why I write, because our words matter.

Awesome: causing feelings of fear and wonder, causing feelings of awe, extremely good. 
When Shaun and I were looking out over the city of Manhattan from the Top of the Rock last fall to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary, the view was awesome, in every sense of the word. But to say that, the most perfect and appropriate word for the situation, didn't come close to what I felt. "Awesome' has been overused in such underwhelming situations for so very long, it doesn't actually mean it's meaning anymore. Awesome has been eroded down to now mean something closer to neat or nice. I realize this is all part of the evolution of language and there are other words that fill in, are invented or borrowed from other languages to build our vocabulary back up, but still, It pains me to see real, meaningful and perfect words thrown around in such casual and insufficient ways. This is why I write, because our words matter!