The Way Some People Spell

I don't see any use in having a uniform way of spelling words.

— Mark Twain

Mark Twain thought that policing the way people spelled was a merry chase, like policing the way people dressed. Thorstein Veblen called it a "conspicuous waste," "archaic, cumbrous, and ineffective."

My grammar school teachers, on the other hand, taught me that spelling was like math: there was one, and only one, right answer.

Of course, that was the early 1960s. 

They also taught us that policemen were our friends, that beatniks were dirty, and that America was the greatest country on earth.

Critical Race Theorists would say they were abusing their authority in order to oppress us and make us conform to the "dominant identity;" but, actually, they were following the lead of a mild-mannered Connecticut teacher, Noah Webster, and teaching us to be Americans.

Frustrated by the outdated teaching materials on hand, Webster revised America's grammar school textbooks immediately after the Revolutionary War, to rid them of references to the king. He also wrote a famous dictionary to rid the new nation's language of Briticisms. In the process, Webster simplified the spelling of hundreds of words. Travelling, for example, became traveling; colour became color; and publick became public. 

Webster believed his spellings, being humbler than their British counterparts were "of vast political consequence" to the young republic. 

And perhaps they were.

But we're an old republic now, soon to become a dictatorship. 

Humble is passé.

We don't care whether you spell smoking as smocking or coffee as covfefe. Just as long as you don't mention white supremacy, marginalization, or dominant-determined identifies.

For my part, call me a dinosaur, but I like Webster's democratic way with words.

Mystery

It is a mistake to confound strangeness with mystery.

— Sherlock Holmes

There are mysteries and there are mysteries.

Mystery (meaning a "puzzle") is a Middle English word derived from the Latin mysterium, meaning a "secret rite" or "initiation."

The medieval Catholic Church taught—and still teaches—that Jesus' life was an amalgam of mysteries, inexplicable to mortals, but worthy of contemplation. It used the Rosary to catalog these puzzles. A mystery meant an event in the life of Christ.

In the Eastern Orthodox Church, mysteries was the term used to name the Seven Sacraments. So, for example, marriage was a mystery. (I can buy that.)

But mystery had a secular meaning, too, at the time.

A mystery meant an occupation, a trade, or a guild.

So, for example, the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers, the guild for the retailers of fish in medieval London, were referred to as a "mystery."

Thanks to their royal charters, these mysteries were powerful monopolies, plying their might through arcane regulations.

They dictated who could sell fish in London and who couldn't; set all prices for their goods; and ran their own courts of law to settle disputes between sellers and suppliers.

The fishmongers, for example, fixed the prices for soles, turbots, herrings, oysters, and eels. They also forbid wholesalers from selling fish directly to the public; outlawed the selling of fish indoors; and prohibited the sale of any fish except salted ones after they were two days old.

The mysteries were also inordinately wealthy. They owned and ran their own apprentice programs, private schools, hospitals, poorhouses, and colonial plantations.

The mysteries' grip on commerce only ended with the rise of capitalism in the 19th century.

We echo the medieval mysteries' power today whenever we speak of guarding "trade secrets."

Coming Soon!

 

Short

It wasn’t by accident that the Gettysburg address was so short.

—Ernest Hemingway

Some things never change.

Good writing has never changed, even though writing itself has—a lot. 

We have, for example, seen use of the subjunctive (as in, "It's necessary my boss be at the meeting") nearly cease; sentence fragments (as in, "No can do") achieve acceptance; and verb conversions (such as "impact," "onboard," and "minoritize") shake off the stench of barbarism.

But good writing remains unchanged.

Good writing is good, first and foremost, because it's short. It coveys what's essential and leaves out the rest. Readers get the writer's point, because the point is made straightaway. 

And the wisdom in brevity never changes, as Ernest Hemingway once told his editor.

"If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them.

"It wasn’t by accident that the Gettysburg address was so short," Hemingway said. 

"The laws of prose writing are as immutable as those of flight, of mathematics, of physics."

Carry a Sharp Blade

The world’s mine oyster, which I with sword will open.

— William Shakespeare

When in The Merry Wives of Windsor Shakespeare's scalawag Falstaff refuses to lend money to his trash-talking henchman Pistol, Pistol replies, "Why then, the world’s mine oyster, which I with sword will open."

Knowing Pistol is a blowhard, Falstaff doesn't take the veiled threat seriously. 

But the English-speaking world has.

"The world's your oyster" we are prompt to say to anyone who's unsure about her next avenue.

It is advice I'd freely offer kids, teens, and twenty-somethings fresh out of college.

It's also advice I'd offer retirees. 

Especially retirees.

So often I hear retirees say that they can't decide how to spend their time productively—that the opportunities to accomplish good things are few and that they lack the know-how needed.

It's a shame our language has forgotten the second half of Pistol's threat, or else we'd say: The world's your oyster if you carry a sharp blade.

In other words, countless pearls are within your grasp provided you can pry them out; so carry a decent knife.

Sound like strange advice?

You should realize that Shakespeare's audience would not have found it so.

Being voracious consumers of oysters, they would have grasped it—as they did Pistol's words—instantly.

That's because large rivers like the Thames teemed with oysters in their day, supplying London with cartloads of the cheap and savory snack.

Playgoers in particular liked to chomp on oysters during performances at the Globe, as archeological evidence shows.

They knew full well oysters demanded a sharp blade. 

So when Pistol called the world his oyster "which I with sword will open," they caught his drift immediately: Oysters are everywhere; they're tasty—and some even have pearls; all you need do is open them.

The gift of a long life expectancy has created countless opportunities for today's retirees to make social, cultural and economic contributions previous generations never dreamed possible.

What a crime it would be to waste them for lack of a sharp instrument.

Call it what you will—retraining, reskilling, upskilling, or lifetime learning—keeping your blade sharp is a prerequisite to fulfillment in your final years on Earth.

So get off your ass and get busy acquiring a few new skills.

The world's your oyster.

Still.

Elizabethan pocketknife, circa 1600
Courtesy Shakespeare Birthplace Trust