Tag Archives: marshmallows

Davenport

Davenport: (n) a large sofa, often one convertible into a bed.

Language is made out of razor blades.

It took me a while to learn this.

If you’re not careful, you’re going to cut people.

And if not agile, you may end up slicing yourself.

Whenever you contend that a certain word is necessary in order to communicate sophistication or perhaps being a well-rounded human, you’ve grabbed the razor blade and slashed out at the world around you.

Over the past fifteen years, I have made a concerted effort to make my language out of marshmallows. Even if they occasionally bounce off someone, it produces a giggle-fest instead of a bruise.

To do this, I had to get rid of the assertion that I became a “better person” by using “better talk.”

Example:

The best way to describe a large seating place in a living room is to call it a couch.

Once you abandon the word “couch,” everything else you say is an attempt to separate yourself from the milling masses and the ignorant idiots.

Even calling it a “sofa” is filled with such pretension that people immediately know you’re trying to communicate your verbal—or even perhaps natural—superiority.

I won’t even discuss the word “divan,” because truthfully, friends, it is not divine.

Yet when I was growing up, there were those who referred to a couch as a davenport. Generally speaking, they were old, white, and held their noses a little higher than others. It was obvious they were in a constant search for obscure terms to describe common things.

Many of them said tomato and potato with a soft sound on the “a.”

“To-mah-to.”

“Po-tah-to.”

Occasionally, when using a word from foreign extract, they actually fell into an accent which they mustered for the moment.

The pastor’s wife from my church had a davenport. That’s what she called it. Now, she never corrected anybody for calling it a sofa or a couch, but she refused to join them in such lollygagging of the tongue.

So let me tell you:

If you want to find out what your profile is on Earth, see how many attempts you make to establish patterns of speech that you have decided are more “high-minded” than others.

If you have many, many of them, you are officially an Earthly asshole.

If you have a few, you’re pretentious.

The recommended number of fussy words that you dare keep around in your lingo is zero. 

Crevasse

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

Crevasse: (n) a deep, open crack

“It’s just about eight feet.”

God, I hated those words.

Growing up, I was the chubby, endearing, intelligent and funny friend. If you put me in a room watching Chiller Theater or listening to music or eating pizza, I was the star of the show.

But every once in a while, I got myself trapped into doing activities that blubber-boys should never participate in whatsoever.

I was thirteen years old and was asked to go on a hike.

I cannot lie—I went on the hike because at the end of the hike we were supposed to have a cookout over an open fire with marshmallows. They did not explain that there would be a five-hour death march preceding it.

I was panting within fifteen minutes, melting with sweat within a half hour—my legs so weak at the end of fifty minutes that I could barely stand.

This in itself was problematic.

But then we came to the Brave Man Crevasse.

The grown-up in charge of the expedition had mentioned it the night before with starry eyes, nearly breathless over the joy each of us would have in taking what he called “The Great Leap.” Struck by stupidity and still dreaming of marshmallows, I had failed to consider the impact of his statement.

About three hours into the hike, with me praying for death or the second coming of Christ, we arrived at The Crevasse.

Very simply stated, it was where the path ended and then resumed eight to ten feet over on the other side, with a drop of about fifty or sixty feet in the middle

The major problem was that before I could even consider what we were doing or how I personally was going to achieve it, many of my friends boldly took the jump and landed safely on the other side. Applause followed.

Pretty soon it was down to Lance and me. Lance was considered to be the coward of our troop—afraid of every type of bug, and really somewhat terrified of dirt. Lo and behold, Lance decided to choose this day for his epiphany of courage. He jumped up in the air and landed, his foot slipping at the last moment, nearly falling, but grabbed by some nearby buddies, who then alternated with pounding him on the back for his courage and clapping wildly.

So there it was—that universal turn of nine heads in my direction.

Their faces were full of encouragement, nodding as if to send good vibrations in my direction.

I thought about following Lance’s example, then realized I was not born stupid. So instead I stepped to the edge and looked over at the craggy hillside, filled with rocks and bushes beneath. My first thought was, “I wonder if I could survive a fall and get the hell out of here in an ambulance?”

But it seemed unlikely and certainly painful.

The delay was apparently unnerving to my cohorts, because they began to express verbal exhortations, which gradually became more ferocious and even challenging. That’s when the dastardly statement came to be.

“Come on! It’s just about eight feet!”

You see, they were wrong. It was a crevasse. There was no place for feet at all. If it had been just eight feet, I could just walk across. But it was eight huge spaces of nothing but air.

Spurred on by a combination of humiliation, edification and (still) the prospect of dinner, I leaped.

But I did not do it feet first. Instead I leaped with the top of my body toward the ledge, barely catching it with my hands, my feet dangling and kicking, and me ready to fall.

Blessedly, all of my friends who had made it safely to the other side grabbed me by whatever they could reach and pulled me up to safety.

My heart was pounding. It didn’t stop its thumping for a solid twenty minutes.

Every single one of the people who leaped across chose not to talk about it.

I think they were terrified that they nearly lost me in the Great Crevasse on the overly lengthy hike in pursuit of toasting a marshmallow.

 

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Cottonmouth

Cottonmouth: (n) a venomous snake of the swamps in southeastern U.S., that grows to about 4 feet

Camping is where two people possessing limited experience take five other people who have no experience, to convince those individuals that they, in their limited experience, are actually frontiersmen.funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

I didn’t know this when I was younger.

I got invited to go on a “woodsy trip” because some of my friends thought it would be nice to have me along so I could be funny and tell stories over the fire at night while they toasted marshmallows to a perfect golden brown.

What they did not realize is that I do not favor huge amounts of physical exertion and have been known to sweat when over-thinking. During the day, I found myself an annoying appendage on a process that needed no annoyance other than insisting that a bunch of know-nothings could go into the wilderness and pretend that their “inner cave” people would come to the surface and teach them.

One of the warnings from our two experts—who, we later found out, had simply read a book on the subject—well, one of their admonitions was to “watch out for poisonous snakes.” In this particular region, the most popular variety of the varmints was called a cottonmouth.

I, for one, was curious how the creature had gotten its name, and was told “not to worry much about it because most of the snakes in the area were black snakes, not cottonmouths.”

I paused. I said, “Do they look differently?”

“No,” replied one of the guides. “They’re both black.”

Figuring I had come up with the best possible follow-up question, I queried, “Since they’re both black, how do you know the difference between a black snake and a cottonmouth?”

He rolled his eyes at me. “Don’t be silly,” he chided. “The cottonmouth has a white mouth, which is obvious.”

Everybody else sitting around the circle accepted this explanation. It stirred some concern inside me. If I was going to be close enough to see the inside of a snake’s mouth, to determine whether it was just your average black snake or a cottonmouth, wouldn’t I already be in trouble?

Unless I had a reputation of being a dentist to the reptilian world, I don’t think they would be opening their mouths unless they were planning to bite me.

I was about to bring up this point to my friends when one of the guides—the leaders of our bodies and souls—patted me on the shoulder and said, “Come on. Just trust the Lord.”

As he walked away, I thought, didn’t God warn Adam and Eve about the serpent? 


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Cinder

Cinder: (n) a small piece of partly burned coal or wood that has stopped giving off flames

I really did not want to complain, even though I was quite capable of doing so.

After all, I was just a kid. If you tell a kid he’s complaining, he’ll explain that you never listen to him, and he’s “sharing his feelings” as you snuff them.

Here’s my story:

One day at church camp one of the more energetic counselors decided we should take a hike through the woods. He had sought out a trail and measured it at 1.2
 miles. His contention was that “anybody should be able to do that.”

I apparently had not joined the “anybody family”–not even related. I had chubby legs that moved slower, reluctant to leave space between my sole and the ground.

On top of that, we could not have been more than twenty yards into the trip when my right foot started to hurt. I apparently was grimacing in some pain, because the zealous counselor came back and told me I needed to step up the pace–otherwise there was a danger the other kids would start making fun of me, and even though he would hate for me to be bullied, he did not know what would happen once the lights went out in the cabins.

Not knowing what that meant but sufficiently alarmed, I soldiered on. Every step hurt.

When we finally arrived at camp after the 1.2 miles, I had broken out in a sweat, was ready to pee my pants and fell to the ground like a sack of rotten potatoes.

I reached down, took off my sneaker (which is what we called them back then) and a tiny pebble-like substance fell out of my shoe. Apparently the night before, when we were sitting around the campfire and I removed my shoes to warm my feet by the flames, I had acquired a cinder in my footwear.

I had walked 1.2 miles on that cinder, leaving a sore spot which upon further inspection, was bleeding.

I did not try to make anyone feel bad, but the counselor did that all on his own.

All I remember is that I was required to put my foot up on a pillow during Vespers and the counselor, who was dwelling in a wilderness of guilt, toasted all my marshmallows and brought them to me. (He got a little grumpy when I complained they were not cooked all the way through, but got over it.)

Even today I have to remind myself that people who have a crooked walk, or have difficulty being what I would consider “righteous,” may be overcoming cinders of burnt-out experiences that I can’t even imagine.

 

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Batch

Batch: (n) a quantity or consignment of goods produced at one time.Dictionary B

Christmas cookies.

They are delightful–and unfortunately, limited to one season instead of being sprinkled throughout the calendar.

We happened upon a great recipe for such a batch of treats which was so simple to put together, but so delicious, that we often made them in huge quantities.

All that was required were corn flakes, marshmallows, butter, green food coloring and red cinnamon candies to simulate holly.

The first batch of these delicacies were so moist, chewy and delicious that we quickly decided to make a second and then a third.

About a week later, I got a hankering for more of these sweet treats, so I opened up the cupboard. I discovered we had plenty of corn flakes, not so many marshmallows, and just a little bit of butter. We had lots of green food coloring and cinnamon candies.

I thought to myself, what difference would it really make? After all, what is a marshmallow, or a teaspoon of butter here or there?

So I stirred up the mixture, and immediately realized that this particular batch seemed stiffer. I didn’t think much about it.

I put them on the cookie sheet to set for a few minutes. When I returned, I discovered that my Yuletide yummies were as hard as rocks.

But I persisted. Honestly, I nearly broke a tooth trying to bite into one.

I was angry. Or was I disappointed? I’m not sure–but somewhere suspended between those two emotions, I lamented that my new batch had failed to fulfill my taste buds.

Someone mentioned the fact that I had altered the recipe, thus tainting this particular batch, but I pooh-poohed that idea, saying, “It should still have worked.”

I have since recanted such foolishness. I am now fully aware that if you want to make a good batch of anything … you’ve got to follow the recipe.

 

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

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Accelerant

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter A

Accelerant: 1. (n.) a substance used to aid the spread of fire.

There are really only two things you can do with fire. You can douse it or you can spread it.

Funny thing about fire is that sometimes it’s a really welcome warming, and other times it can be quite destructive.

So it’s good to have an accelerant around, like gasoline, when you’re trying to get your fire going.  For instance, anybody who’s ever barbecued knows that charcoal lighter is one of your better friends.

And then there are times when fire gets started and you would like to inhibit it from burning down your house. Then the presence of water is suddenly essential.

Here’s what I think–somewhere along the line in our country, we have gotten these two ingredients mixed up. We often pour gasoline on fires that should be put out and we douse pleasant fires with water, which would be ideal for toasting our marshmallows.

I don’t know how this happened. I think some folks just think fire is bad. They think anyone who gets excited, passionate or enthusiastic in any shape or form needs to be hosed down.

Then there are other folks who worship fire and believe the more ablaze the world becomes with controversy, anger and frustration, the better the outcome. I think we need a lesson in utilizing these two elements. Let me make a list:

1. When you see young human beings being creative, even if you don’t understand their particular rendition of talent and ability, bring gasoline, not water.

2. When you’re watching television and two people are arguing, with no intention of listening to each other, throw a bucket of water on it.

3. If you’re in church and everybody’s being quiet because they’re afraid of God, sprinkle some gas and light a match.

4. If you’re in a learning situation and some loudmouth is trying to take over the room and infuse ridiculous ideas into the surrounding hearers instead of freshening them with generosity of spirit, turn the squirt gun on him.

5. If you’re listening to a candidate talk about our country and all you hear is complaining, frustration and promotion of his political party, please apply H2O.

6. But if your four-year-old grandson is asking a bunch of questions about life and is thirsty for knowledge, light the fire.

We could sure use an accelerant in this day and age–to burn off stupidity and welcome a planting of a whole new forest of ideas.

We also might want to back up a water truck to some existing flames which are doing nothing but destroying beauty, and see if we can’t save the landscape.

Water or gasoline?

I do believe that all of us will eventually be evaluated by the next generation on how well we implemented each resource.