Tag Archives: 8-track tape

Attached

Attach: (v) to join or to attribute much value to.dictionary with letter A

I had just finished up sharing at a book convention.

I was sitting quietly by myself, listening. I like to do that.

After speaking for a brief season, I feel it is my responsibility to shut up and let information come my way instead of streaming out of me.

Not far from me, two men were having a conversation. Actually, one man was talking and the other man found himself inundated with lots of opinions. The talker was expressing concern about the deterioration of the U. S. government and the dangers of the coming “New World Order.”

He was reciting his data.

Do you know what I mean? In other words, it was a meticulous collection of syllables, forming words and phrases he had overheard and was now passing along as if they were part of Holy Writ.

The other man, in the receiver position, was trying very hard to be polite around this yapping friend. I thought it was a very interesting profile for this evangelistic doomsayer to take after he had just left an atmosphere filled with creative ideas, new books and exciting storylines.

I knew better than to offer an opinion.

This man was attached.

Just like the beautiful girls in high school who were already dating the football players, I was fully aware that this man was unavailable. He had married himself to an emotional and psychological encounter with another. Perhaps the relationship he was in was abusive or limited, but I wasn’t going to be able to seduce him away from this lover. He was attached.

I merely sat quietly and thought to myself, “Please be intelligent. Stay unattached so you’re accessible and not committed to too many causes that are destined to go the way of the 8-track tape.”

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Thank you for enjoying Words from Dic(tionary) —  J.R. Practix

Achy

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter A

Achy (adj.): Suffering from dull continuous pain: e.g. she felt tired and achy.

That’s not what it makes me think of!

Because of the foolishness of a crazy song, when I hear the word “achy,” I think of Billy Ray Cyrus singing “Achy Breaky Heart.”

I don’t know what it is about our society, but for some reason or another, to escape the doom and gloom of everyday problems, we will occasionally take on trends which are absolutely too silly for words. Our nation has a whole series of these:

  • The hula hoop: a circular plastic tube you placed around your waist, to wiggle around to keep it constantly rolling.
  • How about The Twist? I saw a movie the other day and people were doing The Twist and I wondered how we were so blind to the stupidity of the vision?
  • Of course, that goes for La Macarena, too.

We have these notions that certain things are cool for a season. They are silly and we want to escape the drudgery of thought, so we jump on the bandwagon and start tooting our horns with the rest of the off-key crowd.

Achy Breaky Heart??? How did that ever get past a publisher?? How did that get recorded?

Somewhere along the line we need monitors in our society who remind us that our particular difficulties are not so seriously devastating that we need to escape to utter childish pursuits.

I see them every day–people chasing this, pursuing that…and I’m telling you, even things like Twitter and Facebook will eventually have the same fate as telegraph lines, designer phones, 8-track tapes and My Space.

Didn’t they have an Achy Breaky Heart dance?? That is the definition of a double hell.

I am not trying to be some sort of curmudgeon who doesn’t see the joy in an occasional flippant trend, but when we’re chasing down causes which we know are stupid even as we’re doing them, it would just be better to avoid the detour.

And you know what’s worse? This guy, Billy Ray, is still traveling around every night–singing that song to adoring fans who remember where they were the first time they heard it. Do you know where I was? In musical hell!

It’s just too much. Even the word “achy” itself is a little bit “Sesame Street.”

Please just be mature enough to go ahead and have an ache.