It’s funny how studying mathematics has only made me more aware of how imprecise language is. I find myself constantly re-editing conversations because I am trying to become more and more precise. Having a conversation with me lately is more like talking to a thesaurus.
I have also decided that using words that can be inserted into certain contexts in which they fit, but redefining them to be the words I wish to say, is a much friendlier way to talk to people (at least for the other people). I don’t like using the typical euphemisms like shoot for $hit, or fudge for, well you know. I don’t like using these words because other people know what I am really saying, so I have reassigned certain words in the English language without other’s knowledge to mean what I want them to mean. My favorite word so far is misinterpreted.
I have been using misinterpreted as a euphemism for “you must be stupid.” For example: “You must have misinterpreted what I said when I told you the report was on your desk. I can now see how the report lying on your keyboard, which is on your desk, could be confused for something else even though there is no other paper on your desk.”
Other words I have redefined include:
· The word courteous will now mean jackass. “Sir you are so courteous for backing out of your parking space so swiftly. I now won’t have to find a parking space while I wait for the tow truck to arrive to pick up my mangled vehicle.”
· Sweetie is the now defined as bitch. “You are such a sweetie for honking the horn to alert me that the light turned green 3 milliseconds ago.”
There are some advantages to creating my own definitions for words. I hope that this new way of thinking about language will make me sound more like a lady and less like a drunken, bitter, sailor. Also people won’t know that I am insulting them and I won’t have to deal with the hassle of making a customer/boss/coworker/friend/other human being angry.
