Just wondering what would happen, if, in a world of disinformation, we went back more often, as we do for morning coffee or tea, to the ur-origins of words, and were more mindful of these? What if we cared about word origins or etymons? That kind of wondering always leads me to talking about a favorite mindful practice of looking up word etymologies, or word histories.
If you like even just the sound of “etymons,” we’re immediately friends. If the words Oxford English Dictionary make your heart sing, same here. If it makes your day, seeing in the OED that etymon comes from the ancient Greek ἔτυμος for “true,” I get it.
Which takes me back to the dyslexia I grew up with, undiagnosed until self-diagnosed in my late forties. What became for me over decades a kind of mindfulness practice began in a life-altering disability. Not unlike Brother Lawrence, Hildegard, Julian of Norwich, and other friends I’ve spent much time with, deep in their words, translating. All had disabilities and/or severe illnesses that they met with contemplative attention and intention.
How I found out was helping a student with what I thought was just life, when he said, “Thanks so much. You’re the first teacher to be patient with me with my problems. I just got diagnosed with dyslexia.” Lightbulbs went off for me. All those difficulties reading my whole life, explained. So I began reading about dyslexia and also discovered poet Philip Schultz’s struggles which resonated, as described here.
Looking up word histories slowly imbued with weight and less instability the always-moving-on-the-pages letters and words, and it became more possible to read with less trauma and less stress and more clarity of comprehension.
And for that I can largely thank my favorite teacher in college, Wilson Hall.
Mr. Hall was calm. He was funny. He was brilliant. He saved my life.
I was so shy. I had to make a certain GPA to keep my scholarships, or go home. I worked as a secretary to buy books. One religion teacher required we buy ten expensive books. I don’t think he ever considered that some of us could not afford that.
For many reasons, then, such as being there on scholarship and not wanting to be sent back home for questioning the authorities around me, I did not speak up in class. One day in German, Wilson said something, and I was curious, so later I looked it up. I discovered that what he said and what I found didn’t match up. I thought that was interesting and nothing more. Words fascinated me, even though they had also caused me such grief.
The next day in class, Wilson said, “Did anyone look up [whatever it was]?” I said nothing but I had. The silence spun out. Then Wilson looked disappointed, so I inched my arm up with an awkward hand at the top.
“Carmen?” his face brightened. “What did you find?”
Oh, no, I couldn’t say, You were wrong yesterday. So I kept looking studiously down at my desk and said very quietly and as a mere statement of fact: “I found out that [whatever it was I had found out].”
Wilson smiled. I heard it in his voice, so looked up to see. He was beaming. “What Carmen is not saying is that she looked it up, and discovered I got it wrong yesterday, and what she just said, is right.” Then he talked a long time about questioning everyone and everything and looking things up as my brown face warmed and reddened, or so it felt.
That experience blew my world open as far as learning goes. I’d never had a teacher say they got something wrong AND had looked it up, etc.
Wilson talked all the time about word histories, and I asked him during one year of many of my knowing little sleep, daily painful anxiety, and severe depression, all undiagnosed, if he would let me take an independent study course in etymologies with him. He said yes. After I graduated, he made that into an official class.
Because Wilson drew all these mountain peaks in class one day on the board, and put different-looking words on top of them, and then went underneath and showed how they were all connected by a same root underground. From that moment, I was gone down that rabbit hole. Forever.
Wilson also liked to ask how many pillars there were in the most passed by building on campus, and NO one could ever say how many. He would look out the window all the time and muse and kind of talk to himself about Emerson and Thoreau and Whitman, his favorites, and say to us who were behind him in the room: “Just remember. When they pass around the purple kool-aid, be the ones who don’t drink it.”
You never ever forget such a teacher. So thankful for Wilson Hall. He later went to Emory in Integrative Studies for a Ph.D. He went from Mr. Hall to Dr. Hall to Wilson for me.
To return to the chalkboard meme above, we read: Latin Cantare “sing” / How many words below do you find related to “cantare” for “sing”?
I’m enchanted by their chanting and that descant. It’s like an incantation. Mornings on our farm, a cantata by three chanticleers woke us. The sailors are singing a charming, sea-salt-accented chanty. I recant chocolate, Carmen never said.
Answer: 11 here. enchanted chanting descant incantation cantata chanticleers charming accented chanty recant Carmen. All have roots in Latin cantare “sing”–of course I only know some of these connections like accent and charming because . . . I looked them up!
Thank you again to all who guessed earlier on social media!