Category Archives: B words

Blue

Blue: (v) to make or become blue.

Dictionary B

Often life arrives in a very pale shade, threatening despair, and I too quickly grab the “blues” to darken it.

Yes, I have a fear that things are not going to go well. I will admit it.

To me, optimism always seems to be a trap–similar to being informed that you have a great amount of cash waiting for you in a Nigerian bank.

After a while, you stop believing in miracles, but unfortunately also lose your ability to accept reality but instead, interpret all your life through a prism of “blue.”

I know there are depressions which are caused by deficiencies in the human body, but there are also depressions we permit to settle in because the contortions of greater effort or hilarious hope are just too painful.

How much light does it take to change blue to faith?

I don’t know. And I certainly cannot convince myself that pursuing such virtue is always plausible.

Maybe I could just stop using my blue crayon to color in the pictures quite so often.

 

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Bludgeon

Bludgeon: (v) to beat someone repeatedly with a heavy object.

Dictionary B

All she said to me was, “I need help.”

I think it was probably the tone of her voice which let me know that my young friend on the phone was in trouble.

She had married a man who certainly had a reputation for being psychologically imbalanced. But she insisted she loved him, and truthfully, he seemed to thrive in their relationship, losing some of his waywardness.

But then he got used to her.

She wasn’t magical anymore.

She was available–maybe too available.

So since it was impossible for him to beat on a mirror, he started beating on her.

Little infractions at first (if there is such a thing).

But I could tell by listening to her on the phone that she was in deep trouble and I needed to get over to her.

My car wasn’t fast enough. By the time I arrived, he had bludgeoned her, making her face appear to be twice its normal size. Blue, black, purple and strains of red began to surface with the swelling.

As I tried to calm her down, I watched the damage grow right before my eyes. She was so wounded.

I had never seen it up close and personal, just portrayed on TV with make-up and tricks. But this was real.

I felt pain just looking at her face.

It looked as if she would never be able to totally reconstruct her features again. As I comforted her and we waited for the arrival of family and a police officer, I told myself to register the image of her countenance in my mind for all time.

For you see, sometimes violence has a slight sniff of propriety.

Maybe we think it’s a good way to get even. But any time you lay your hand against another traveler, the human body displays the vulgarity of your efforts with the horrific image of swollen pain.

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Blown

Blown: (adj) past participle of blow

Dictionary BYou can’t make a duck bark. It’s a simple statement.

Therefore, it’s virtually impossible to get your dog to quack.

Patterns of behavior are established through choice and genetics, and maintained by stubborn tradition.

So as I listen to people complain about leaders who are causing turmoil and steering the American public into bad decisions, I look on, perplexed.

  • Nobody can make me prejudiced.
  • Nobody can turn me into a bigot.
  • Nobody can suddenly convince me that black people are evil or that people from China are out to get me.

I am the one who is ready to hear the nonsense.

So therefore, it is the responsibility of our citizens to own up to the fact that the transitions which have occurred in our lifetime, which have promoted truth or at least tolerance, have been avoided by many, who have sat by, pretending to be part of the parade, only to whisper complaints to each other as the floats go by.

There is a disgruntled spirit in our country which is blown by every ill wind.

It is unconfronted.

It is denied–as we pretend that everything is alright.

It isn’t.

We are still one of the most bigoted countries in the world, intolerant of the behavior of each other, and willing to become violent if someone takes our parking space.

I don’t think we will change these attitudes by hatching meanness to address the meanness.

But as long as people are blown by every wind of doctrine and every carnival barker, we will suffer under a cloud of uncertainty.

 

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Blow

Blow: (v) to create an air current.

Dictionary B

Although I was greatly impressed with the poetry, I have to admit that when Bob Dylan proffered the idea that the answer is “Blowin’ in the Wind,” I was incredulous.

I do believe the Earth speaks to us.

I think there are obvious ways of thinking and acting that overall prosper a bit better than others. But God gave us a brain because emotions wear thin and souls can be too ethereal.

There are those who make my acquaintance who must “feel” everything to believe it’s real, and I have many friends who are convinced that prayer is the only way to receive lasting peace and tranquillity.

Yet I will tell you–that brain sits up there, begging to be used and certainly needing to be renewed with fresh insight every day .

I like the word “blow” because it has so may different representations.

It can be a burst of wind.

Or it can be an admission that we screwed up. “I blew that.”

It also has one or two naughty implications, which keep it even more intriguing.

But the answers we seek are probably not going to blow in our direction. They will require us to take a breath of air and release it, giving our brain enough oxygen… to blow forth some innovation.

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Blouse

Blouse: (n) a woman’s loose upper garment resembling a shirt

Dictionary B

“Change the language and you can change the world.”

With a few exceptions, I totally believe this.

I’ve tried to put this into practice in my life by being equally complimentary to both men and women. It might sound strange, but normally, our species does not do that.

Two guys meeting to go out to a ballgame don’t usually comment on each other’s outfits. Even if we think a friend is wearing a great-looking jersey, we button our lips for fear of coming across gay.

But if they run across a woman they think is fairly attractive, they just might compliment her on what she’s wearing so as to communicate that they think she is sexually viable and place themselves for consideration.

This is perhaps one of the greatest proofs of chauvinism–“just part of the jungle game.”

Do I think it’s dangerous?

Do I think it’s hypocritical?

What I think is that I choose not to participate.

If my buddy has a nice haircut and doesn’t smell like crap, I will probably go ahead and tell him. If he thinks I’m a homosexual for doing so, I just figure the problem is not mine, but his.

And if I see a woman dressed in a stunning blouse, I will tell her how attractive I think it is, without staring at her breasts while doing so. I also will not stand around and wait for her to compliment me in turn.

A blouse is a blouse is a blouse.

It is a female shirt.

As a shirt, it carries no sexuality and truthfully, is androgynous–open to commentary.

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Blot

Blot: (n) a dark mark or stain

Dictionary B

It was a typical piece of white typing paper.

I didn’t even look at it.

I stuck it into the tray of my printer and Xeroxed a copy of some document that seemed pertinent in the moment.

I pulled it out, looked at it, and suddenly saw this tiny black dot in the corner.

I didn’t give it a second thought. Who cares about a blot? Nobody will notice. It doesn’t make any difference.

If I pass it off as a clean sheet of paper, I can probably fool people into believing it’s just fine and there was really no blot there in the first place.

But after ten minutes, I took the paper, wadded it up and threw it away.

Why? Because someone will always see the blot and wonder if I was so stupid I missed it, or so careless that I thought it didn’t matter

 

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Bloom

Bloom: (v) to produce flowers; be in flower.

Dictionary B

Perhaps the most difficult thing for human beings to do is admit that what we are pursuing is just not blooming–especially if we’ve gone through contortions to promote it.

There are just signs that ideas, beliefs and goals are growing in the right direction and are worth further cultivation. When these signs are absent, we have to be willing to walk away and maintain the good cheer necessary to start again.

What are the signs?

1. Good ideas green.

Long before they bloom, they show some sprout–what you planted is actually emerging from the dirt. There is a greening.

2. We don’t find ourselves needing to make excuses.

I can always tell when I’m pursuing a faulty pathway–I need to over-proclaim its value or constantly explain why it’s important. Some truths do need to be self-evident.

3. Other folks see the growth and get excited.

America is a victim of hype. We spend too much time trying to advertise instead of asking ourselves if it actually has any chance of progress.

  • If you plant a seed and get some green, then comes the bloom.
  • If you don’t plant a seed there’s no chance for greening–that is true.

But don’t expect anything to become flowery if it doesn’t have… da-vine.

 

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Bloodline

Bloodline: (n) ancestors or pedigree

Dictionary B

“Blood is thicker than water.”

This is one of those annoying sayings that continues to pop up and fails to be refuted because no one wants to come across anti-family.

God forbid we would challenge the Victorian concept of our particular DNA sprouts carrying more holiness than other human beings on Earth.

Even though many tout themselves to be Christians and worship a fellow named Jesus, who said that when “we only love those of our own household, we’re no better than the heathen,” we still place great significance out of which womb we made our exit.

I suppose enjoying your brothers and sisters can be very exciting–but if that is the case, why isn’t it even more exciting to have additional brothers and sisters?

Life is not a reenactment of “Games of Thrones,” where an heir must be conceived through the pure bloodline of a king, assumed to be superior to the serfs.

Rather, it’s learning to appreciate each and every human as beautiful, and finding reasons to get along with him or her.

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Blood

Blood: (n) the red liquid that circulates in the arteries and veins

Dictionary B

Common.

Although we extol the value of finding things in common, there is a great danger of taking things of value and making them much too common.

When I realized that my word for today was “blood,” I immediately became aware that I was torn between two emotions:

First, a realization that blood is so much a part of the entertainment industry, and even the theology of Christianity, that it nearly has no significance; and secondly, escaping this inane idea and grasping the notion that the presence of blood is life, and the loss is death.

Yet after I’ve seen my fifteenth murder for the evening on television or gone to church and looked at the sight of a tortured man bleeding from a cross, I become hardened and inflexible.

It is frightening.

It is nearly abominable that we can slaughter human beings in an action/thriller indiscriminately, or think that the little bit of grape juice we pour into a plastic cup adequately represents the sacrifice of a courageous redeemer.

I, for one, am tired of symbolism.

I am weary of being told that it’s “just a television show, just a video game or just a way of having a ceremony in remembrance of a human sacrifice.”

These are huge concepts which demand our introspection instead of our frivolous observance.

 

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Blonde

Blonde: (adj) fair or pale yellow hair.

Dictionary B

I’ve always insisted on being a blonde.

Blonde is a word that is usually associated with feminine mystique. For instance, “gentlemen prefer blondes.”

It does not say, “gentlemen prefer being blonde.”

I once was very proud of my hair. I grew it long, nearly to my shoulders, washed it and spent a lot of time in the sun, hoping to bleach it out to that glorious, Beach Boys, bushy hairdo. I especially enjoyed the tug of the hairbrush as it labored through the luscious locks.

It wasn’t that I believed that women liked blonde-haired men. After all, the classic line is “tall, dark and handsome.” I was kind of medium, chubby and blonde.

I liked it, though. I liked the way it looked, I liked the way it felt, and I sensed it translated me from being an Ohio-born, rural ruffian to a transplanted California cavalier.

I nurtured it, I flipped it, I let it blow in the wind. It became my friend. Although blonde hair does not offer much conversation, my hope was that it would solicit some.

I kept it blonde, I insisted on blonde.

Until one day I woke up and it changed colors.

Scalp.

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