Sad news, huh? I was watching this show with my roommate tonight. This was my first venture into the Dolls' world, and it was a strange trip. So I know it's been a while since I blogged. To the two people out there who read this--I apologize. Last week was complete chaos--grades were due, we had out-of-town visitors at school, I proctored the ACT for the first time. It was non-stop action, so there was no time for blogging. But I'm back now. Sadly, I have lost the 10 words I was going to post last week. I knew leaving them out of the baggy was a bad idea. I guess I should explain that. There is a system to this madness. Each week I take 10 cards out of the "bag 'o words I memorized last time" (all the words I memorized back when I had grandiose dreams of going to a very impressive PhD program); I put a paperclip over the 10 words and then I put them in a bag with the rest of the words. Last week I was feeling a bit cavalier, so I left the words in my planner. Obviously they ran away. But--I have new words anyway--one of the perks of having 750 words. And, these are the last words in the old bag (do you hear the music reaching a crescendo as I pull those last cards out of the tattered Ziploc bag?) How exciting! Or maybe sad--if you look at how quickly I let go of my PhD dreams and submitted to reality. But whatever. On to the next challenge.
Finishing the bag of words I had, theoretically already memorized reminded me of my previous ambition. I must say that I am a much more complacent person than I was back then. The weird thing is that using that word seems so negative. Why, if the word means contended, does complacent seem to be used negatively? I have noticed that learning these words over the past few months has caused me to pay more attention to the colloquial language I use. I've tried to add more interesting words to my language instead of just using the easy and convenient words. Now that I've finished this stage of the process, I feel like I should make some kind of word collage. I'll be thinking about this as the week goes along. Maybe I'll have something clever for the next post...
Today was an interesting day in a few ways. I read one of my favorite passages to my students today. It's a passage from a book by Donald Miller called To Own a Dragon. This particular passage talks about the importance of character. He says that a friend called him out on taking a free cell phone when he knew that his old phone was out of warrantee. I've read this passage to other classes before, so I knew we would get into some interesting conversations about the truth, your word, and character. I must say with a contrite spirit, that I haven't always told the truth. I've lied about little stupid stuff--like saying I was still a student in order to get the student discount. Reading this passage always reminds me of the value of my word. It challenges me to make my word mean something. I want my deeds to always be above question. I was also a bit bothered by some of the things that came up in conversation. In Miller's book, he gives an example of someone getting too much change back and not saying anything. While I would say the person is culpable for taking the money, some of my students thought that wasn't the case. I always want to think that my students cleave to the truth, and when they say the truth isn't really the ultimate thing of importance, I worry. I want people to live by a code of honesty. Maybe I can start a one-woman campaign for truth. We'll see! I'm going to take down the theory that the truth is just a construct.
On that soapbox note, here are the new words:
1. complaisant:agreeable
2. conjecture: guesswork
3. circumvent: to get around something
4. cloister: to seclude; a place devoted to religious seclusion
5. coup: a brilliant, sudden action; a sudden overthrow of a government (I love this word)
6. craven: cowardly
7. consummate: to complete; perfect; supreme
8. diatribe: a bitter criticism
9. digress: to depart from the main subject
10. dilapidated: ruined by neglectand
there you have them. bye.
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1 comment:
I tried to watch that show once and it was too much for even me! :) Glad to see you're back. I've missed reading!!
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