Verisimilitude, gravitumbling and the construction of cardboard forts.

For all of my recent talk of formalities and grammar, I feel as if I should swing the pendulum a bit and dare to walk on the other side of the pedantic road. While formulating a strong resume and knowing your punctuation well enough to start an internet revolution is of importance, it is of no more importance than the written word itself. Commas mean very little if your vocabulary is dim and your imagination left in 1986, somewhere underneath your card table forts and dreams of being a marine biologist who invents houses in which humans commune with sparkly starfish. No. Commas, clauses and concerns about the overuse of the exclamation point are but side notes of good writing. Written craftsmanship comes from within; and the really good stuff emerges from the depths where, during the daylight, most of us are afraid to go past the age of eight. When I expressed my concern over the state of written things, I meant not to deal exclusively with what is learned within a book of grammar. My concern lies just as much with an overall disinterest in developing a voice, with but a lazy desire to expand one’s vocabulary, and a general disregard for the imagination.

Developing one’s voice is imperative for good writing. Developing one’s voice is essential for having opinions, making a stand and involving oneself in any type of activity that requires but a morsel of passionate enthusiasm. Developing one’s voice does not include mimicking or learning to say “baaa” on cue. One’s voice is constructed from interests, affections and missions beyond the surface. One’s voice is composed of failures, mistakes and instances of blubbery. Finding one’s voice is making discoveries, such as one’s propensity to use the word blubbery primarily because one finds the word both aptly descriptive and amusing. Finding one’s voice is essential to having something to say and knowing how to say it.

Verisimilitude. What a word. One almost hisses as the word rolls off the tongue, onto the lips and into the air. There are words that may strike one’s fancy that are locked up in a dictionary, or novel, all bursting at the seams waiting to be discovered. Words stay inside books when the pages are not turned by fingers aching to make new discoveries. It seems cruel actually, trapping words inside of books. If the words are not allowed to jump around from one set of eyes to another, what use are they? Why were they written at all? Seeking out words acquaints one with new ways of expression, fires up the imagination and facilitates newly formed affections. As a child I created new words for everything. I made up code words, adjectives and monikers. I am still apt to let a new word escape from my mouth, especially during bouts of delirium or inspiration. Finding reading but a bore only limits one’s ability to be amused. For, when one abhors the written word, one sees to it that they are kept here on earth, poking fun at those sitting and giggling in card table fort spaceships, creating words such as fortspacing and gravitumbling.

If one shows disregard for card table fort spaceships or any other variety of imaginative space craft, it is almost guaranteed that their desire to form attachments to words or craft finely tuned stories will be null. Taking oneself too seriously, too often, is a surefire way to lose track of what is important. A quick viewing of the movie “Hook” is enough to acquaint any attorney with the tragedy of abandoning one’s imagination. One does not need to be an attorney to forget the simple pleasures though. Shying away from what lurks within, no matter how silly or childish it may seem, only keeps you grounded. This paragraph is not to condone shucking it all and quitting one’s profession to become a cobbler for elves in the North Pole but merely a reminder to leave the ground every now and then. Finding oneself enamored with a children’s book or a newly discovered adjective may be all it takes to let one’s inner space captain fly.

While I highly suggest all persons have a propensity toward knowing how to communicate effectively through the use of grammar, punctuation and sentence structure, I also suggest that everyone allow themselves to find enjoyment in what they are writing. There is a good chance that you will bore us all if you do not. If this is troublesome, choose a new word, let it roll off your tongue and delight in the sensation of the consonants and vowels as they make their way into the air you breathe. Verisimmmmmmmmilitude. For further inspiration, watch the video below as Stephen Fry spouts off about the fresh sensuousness of language.

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