In a word...

In a word...

@propitious.bsky.social

Sometimes the right word is all you need to make sense of the situation.

689 followers318 following689 posts

ultracrepidarian ...(n.) a person who gives opinions on things that they don't know much about From Latin, meaning the cobbler shouldn't judge things beyond his shoes

Kafkaesque, Orwellian, Atwoodian, Dickensian, Bradburyan... ...enough authors understood the intersection of politics, power and human nature that their names can be used as adjectives.

Hamartia ...(n.) a severe flaw or error in judgement that leads to a person's downfall "... And it is the nature of a hamartia that you can’t see it coming. You think, 'Man, this is great, I’m going up forever!' ... you reach the top and you start the descent." -John Greene

Panoply ...(n.) a large and impressive collection of things (literal or figurative) "Why did the night withhold its panoply of sounds?" -David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle

Intransigent ...(adj.) unwilling to change your mind, stubborn to a fault "Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads..." -Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Sempiternal ...everlasting, eternal, unchanging "The one thing which we seek with insatiable desire is to forget ourselves, to be surprised out of our propriety, to lose our sempiternal memory and to do something without knowing how or why; in short, to draw a new circle." -R.W. Emerson

Existential dread ...the anxiety that comes from life not being what we expected, hoped or knew it to be “Do you believe we are masters of ourselves or merely dance like puppets on strings having the illusion of independence?” -Winston Graham

Phantasmagoria ...a constantly changing sequence of lights and images that make a scene, like in a dream or nightmare. A hallucination or a mental montage. Comes from lantern shows depicting ghosts and other optical illusions with lanterns during the Victorian era

Peripatetic ...someone who likes to walk from place to place. Someone who travels around, especially for work. Itinerant. From Greek, for walking up and down the hallways. Refers to Aristotle teaching while walking with his students. He founded the Peripatetic School.

The American government interned 120,000 Japanese Americans in rustic camps during WW2 and convinced the public they were a threat. Many lost everything and some were US citizens. Not a single case of spying by a Japanese American was ever found.

In a word... reposted

A German word for being embarrassed by the actions of someone else is Fremdscham, or “foreign shame.” A similar word from Icelandic is aulahrollur, which is quite tricky to translate but basically means something along the lines of “cringe quake” or “douchebag chills”

Languorous vs. Languid ...Languorous (adj.) a usually pleasant type of tiredness and inactivity, like laying in a hammock on a summer day ...Languid (adj.) Unmoving or slow due to depression, illness or exhaustion From the same Latin verb

Don't Hesitate by Mary Oliver If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed...1/3

It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb. 3/3 Joy is not made to be a crumb!

Ruderal ...a type of plant that starts to grow in places humans have taken over, like sidewalk cracks, or after distasters like forest fires and volcanic eruptions. It feels like a nice metaphor for hope