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Cadwell NOT Caldwell

Every word you say is your victory

[ 3 minute read ]

Opinion Mental Health

       'Every word you say is your victory.' Why would the ALDI checkout person say that to me? Here's how the full conversation went.

       'Sorry, I realise you might want to pop off and do something different but I haven't checked my bank balance and it is easier to fail here than it is with the self-service tills.'

       'They are getting better.' He then scanned my choices and told me the amount, which I successfully paid with a card. 'Do you want a receipt?'

       'Yeh, why not? It tells me where I have been. You never know I might have Alzheimers or some other memory problem and not remember it.' It was supposed to be taken as me making light of a condition, but I really do have memory problems. Later, I checked my bank balance and I had oodles more money to spend but I simply could not remember not spending much; I might have been on a spending spree and left my purchases in a taxi in a foreign country.

       'Every word you say is your victory.' This he said in a drawling monotone.

Was he being ironic, derisive even? Was he mocking me? I have firmly accused family members of doing something I disapproved of when it was me who did it all along; but I have no memory of doing it at the time I made the accusations, and in also having no memory of a reason to act in a particular way, have on the face of things disapproved of the action. It completely supports a theory that if you saw yourself coming towards yourself on a pavement you would cross the road to avoid the meeting. That is a theory, but the glaring truth is that it seems that I have acted in ways that I would normally avoid. Clearly, I didn't think things through and find better solutions at those times.

Perhaps it was crass of me to highlight memory problems and I should have just said yes to the receipt. Perhaps though, I don't subscribe to the bovine attitude of chewing the cud while being milked. Perhaps I am not inclined to be a sheep and instead see myself as a goat. In any case, the checkout person's declarative statement, however he meant it, has affected how I will present myself in future.

Talking to checkout people has always been fun for me and I have always thought that it gives them some light relief from the tedium of their work. I have also understood that I may be inadvertently waking them up from a comfortable snooze during which, with practice, they can just pass things past the scanner without waking. They may surreptitiously look at me with a jaded eye and be seeking a way to press the snooze button on me. But, just like getting up out of bed to get some water or take a leak, the damage is done. Beta waves are replaced with Alpha waves in the head and the return to Theta waves may not be possible before the alarm goes off. Deep sleep is in the past and dozing is the only route to oblivion, and no amount of scrabbling for the fast disappearing tail of beneficial slumber will bring it back.

Badinage, or 'light playful banter' to the builder's mate, is something I have never been able to accept from anyone who is not a close friend or a well-known acquaintance. I am, in almost every circumstance when I am targeted, reduced to a small boy shivering in the frigid air of acute embarrassment, and I simply will not compete in the leg-pulling, the chaffing, or the clowning of other people; activity that makes up a pseudo-competition that even the competitors do not realise they want to win. Surely, it is an ego thing. Certainly it has to be one-up-manship that in the presence of a romantically desirable person is conducted with a good deal of smugness and an expectation of favour. 'If I verbally crush this person I might get a secret clinch. I only have to show my intellect to be superior to the other person's and the prize is mine!' 

At least it is done on the open. At least the poking fun is not secretly done in dark corners. At least it is not back-stabbing; a wound that everyone else perceives except the victim; surely the cruelest cut of all. Emotional doors are slammed when they were once open and friendly faces are turned away, yet the victim is unaware of this and is left sadly wondering what is wrong. It isn't a conscious thing. It is a hidden drain on resources; a sucker of energy, and a malevolent source that inhibits progress. Indeed, it is the cruelest cut. Only a coward or a cheat would wield the sword that slashes the unwary in this way, or push the dagger forward from a hidden recess or heavy shroud. The cheat by maligning others hopes to gain favour when comparisons are made. By inference the message is, 'I would never act in that way' and paradoxically, 'You can trust me.' The coward is afraid of rebuke from someone they feel may be admirably able to defend themselves and, in the cowards mind, gain a victory over them; and this done publicly; for the coward, the worst scenario of all. For them, it means they inflicted the wound but they must bear the suppuration and the stink of putrefaction. For them, ringing bells will precede their movements and cries of 'Unclean! Unclean!' will be heard.

I shall pull my head back into my protective tortoise shell and warp some words to satisfy myself:

       'Every word you say is your victory.' Why, thank you kind sir. I shall up-cycle my wife's angry words, 'You're a wordsmith!' and take your donated words to feel confident that my intention is clearly and evidently good and I have spoken wisely.

All my posts: https://learn1.open.ac.uk/mod/oublog/view.php?u=zw219551

or search for 'martin cadwell -caldwell' to eliminate caldwell returns (take note of the position of the minus sign) or 'martin cadwell blog' in your browser.

I am not on YouTube or social media.

[ 5 minute read ]

It doesn't seem to matter if I come up with unusual names for my story characters. I thought I had invented the name 'Harrari', which originates from the sound of cars passing over the joins in a dual carriageway over-flying a roundabout near to where I lived. I use that name for my abandoned alien friend. 

Of course, I know that the name 'Hakim' is real. I have no doubt heard in it a Hollywood film. I use that name to identify an avatar spirit.

Hakim and Harrari, as characters, know each other and sometimes act as counsel in my posts. So, I have added tags to a few posts, 'Harrari and Hakim'.

There is a YouTube video, titled 'Yuval Noah Harari on Sky News', 'The World With Yalda Hakim' that is listed above my post 'My alien friend and my avatar' on the DuckDuckGo search ranking index! I thought 'Harrari' might be unique and a strong individual name for a character. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that combining it with another strong name would not be unique at all. In the modern world, we are all trying to come up with a hook that is our own. 

I think I recall reading something that buzzed around. 'We are all plagiarists because every word we write has already been written in the dictionary.' Except they are in a different order.

I love words. My bedtime reading when I was sixteen was a Collins Pocket Thesaurus. One might think I would be really good at words but we have to use them to become proficient. I love words so much that I write the 'pretty' ones I find on a large piece of paper that is stuck to my wall. Eventually the paper is full and I have to replace it, but I keep the 'full' pieces of paper. How can a two-dimensional object (to all intents and purposes to the common man) 'get' full?

I have in mind calling up some of these words, sort of randomly, and then writing something that coherently includes them. Here are some of the words I have recorded:

desuetude; eschew; endue; surplice; sine qua non; internecine; commingle; aegis; spissitude; anoesis; deleterious; amphiboly; longanimity; ataraxia; immure; esperance; quotidian; obdurate; dilatory; minatory; perfidious; rebarbative; divagate; paludal; atemporal; nescience; oscitant; zugzwang (one of my favourite words); bathos; metastasis; apperception.

I know the meaning of some of these, and others I have to read the attached meaning. I almost never use any of them. The spell checker hates half of them. so, let's have a go at using a few, at least half, anyway. I will write without preparation or any idea of where it is going.

I don't know what to do

(Glossary at the end)

Today, I found myself in a zugzwang position. Either I continue living in a state of anoesis or swerve towards ataraxia. In any case, I would need to make big changes in my life, and no amount of esperance would cause me to consider either position to be fruitful. One might, in describing me, use the word 'feckless'. Growing up in some seclusion, I have always had to make strong attempts to commingle with the common man. Most of the time, I have to suffer the surplice of my neighbour's nescience. Our conversations, though not quotidian, were often enough to endue in me an idea that his paludal mind is set on obdurate behaviour towards all and everyone. A 'Do Not Bend' package delivered through my letterbox, addressed to his girlfriend, was described in his deleterious, almost minatory, manner, as being delivered by a lazy delivery person who couldn't be bothered to seek his front door. The truth is that his continental-style letter-box has insufficient depth to accept non-bendable packages, such as photographs, and the delivery person was more conscientious than oscitant or clumsy. 

To free myself from being permanently affected by people who divagate into rebarbative and perfidious gossip, or general loose cohesion and frippery in their statements, albeit atemporal in nature, a metastasis in my own life must occur. I feel that I should immure myself within my own safe scope of apperception. I have a predilection towards logic and an aptitude for taking two positions simultaneously. Perhaps, my longanimity is wearing thin and I crave peace and equanimity, yet, I can not help thinking that ataraxia is enormously difficult for me to achieve simply because I need sharp mental stimulation, the spissitude of which must be high. Flighty tidbits does nothing for me. Clearly, being perturbed pleases me. That then means that anoesis must be the preferred state to be in. However, I know I grow tired of japes and personal witticisms and seek knowledge to act as superstructure for my thoughts. Neither condition then seems to be an acceptable recluse. Of course no-one wants to make a change that negatively impacts on the rest of their life, and zugzwang positions make us choose the least harmful path. Perhaps, my dilatory personality will allow me to continue to oscillate between my private home-life of quiet study and submission to the general desuetude of common sense in my fellow man for a while longer. 

-end-

I think I might have used the words correctly. In any case, I had fun playing around with them. It is one of my hobbies. I am certain that if I used those words, as I have done, in a conversation with someone who knows them, I would see a skeptical question on their face that asks, 'Do you really know what you are saying?' And, because I like to be honest with myself, but also fair and benevolent with myself, I would have to laugh and say 'No, not really.'

I wrote the little story using a selection from the list of words. The meanings of the words I used from the list are here. I have cut and pasted from whichever online dictionary comes up first.

Zugzwang - (my own understanding) This is a German word used in chess. A zugzwang position is one in which a move must be made but any move will result in a following negative position - usually the loss of a piece or consequent check-mate, Being in 'check' is often a zugzwang position.

anoesis - (my own understanding) a state of mind that consists of pure sensation without cognitive content.

ataraxia - a state of freedom from emotional disturbance and anxiety, tranquility.

esperance - an archaic and now obsolete word meaning 'hope' (Let's bring it back)

commingle - to mix thoroughly

surplice - punishment, torture, anguish; punishment of hell

nescience - (my own idea is that this word is like 'conscience' and 'prescience', it is to do with perception and understanding and the prefix 'ne' works to negate) 1, lack of knowledge 2. agnosticism

quotidian - 1. usual or customary, everyday; (quotidian needs) 2. daily (a quotidian report) 3. ordinary, commonplace (paintings of no more than quotidian artistry) 

endue - provide with a quality or trait

paludal - 1. relating to marshes 2. produced by marshes, as miasma or disease

obdurate - 1. unmoved by persuasion, pit, or tender feelings; stubborn; unyielding 2. stubbornly resistant to moral influence; persistently impertinent (an obdurate sinner)

deleterious - 1. harmful; injurious (deleterious influences) 2. injurious to health (deleterious gasses)

minatory - menacing, threatening

oscitant - 1. drowsy or inattentive 2. yawning as with drowsiness, gaping 3. dull, lazy or negligent

metastasis -  change, transference

immure - 1. to shut in; seclude or confine 2. to enclose within walls 3. to imprison

divagate - (my own understanding focus on the 'div' part, to digress or deviate) 1. to wander, stray 2. to digress in speech

rebarbative - causing annoyance, irritation or aversion; repellent

perfidious - deliberately faithless, treacherous. deceitful ; a perfidious lover

atemporal - not given to time, timeless

apperception - logical reasoning through the exchange of opposing ideas

longanimity - patient endurance of hardship, injuries, or offense; forebearance

spissitude - density, thickness

japes - (from my Roget's thesaurus:  witticisms; jape (verb) amuse oneself

dilatory - 1. tending to delay or procrastinate; slow, tardy 2. intended to delay, gain time, or defer decision; a dilatory decision

desuetude - discontinuance, disusage, disuse

Twenty five words I have never used before. I am pleased.