I have lately taken to reblogging some of my previous old posts, some of the 1,676 I have at the moment and this one probably adds to. I do it not because I am being lazy, but because now, more than ever, I have people looking at my posts, looking at the pictures, and even sometimes reading what I wrote. So I take pride in re-presenting some of the little essays I am most proud of or have recently rediscovered myself.
Yesterday was focused on lying as an art form.
That’s actually Mark Twain in the background of this picture. Which is a lie. And if you can’t easily tell that, then no wonder Trump is now our president.
I re-blogged an old essay on telling lies… a how-to sort of piece called Lying as a Form of Social Responsibility And then I promptly followed that up with a bit about one of the biggest lies I told my classes every year when they asked me how old I was and why I wasn’t already retired. I called it Mickey is 561 & 1/2 Years Old which is a lie, but probably reasonable to believe considering the old saying, “Old English teachers never die. One day they just lose their class.”
On the day I had the weird confrontation with the coyote in the early morning light I wrote Morning With Coyotes and found it to be such a weird experience that I had to re-post What Do Martians Look Like?
Today I found a piece that I still love very much called Mother Mendocino and re-blogged it, and it already had 9 views before I even finished this essay about re-blogging.
So re-blogging isn’t just being lazy and fishing for likes, it is about reconnecting old ideas to new. And to relive past writing moments and treasured reflections. I intend to do more of it. Especially with posts so old that you newer readers have never had the chance to look at the pictures and ignore the text. So now I have fulfilled my moral obligation to warn you of what’s coming. Now protecting yourself from what I might re-blog next is entirely your responsibility.
Catch a Falling Star 
Hurtful Words
Yesterday’s post got me thinking about how words and the power behind words can actually hurt people. They can you know. Words like “brainiac”, “bookworm”, “nerd”, “spaz”, “geek”, and “absent-minded professor” were used as weapons against me to make me cry and warp my self-image when I was a mere unformed boy. I do not deny that I was smarter than the average kid. I also recognize that my lot in life was probably better than that of people assaulted with words like “fatty”, “moron”, “loser”, and “queer”. Being skinny as a child, there was actually only one of those deadly words that was never flung my direction. Words like that have the power, not only to hurt, but even to cripple and kill.
We all stand naked at times before a jury of our peers, and often they decide to throw stones.
I try to commit acts of humor in this blog. Or, at least, acts of verbal nit-witted goofiness that make at least me laugh. I have been told by readers and students and those forced to listen that I only think I am funny, and I am a hopelessly silly and pointless old man (a special thank you to Miss Angela for that last example, used to tell me off in front of a science class I was substitute teaching years ago.) But those words do not hurt me. I am immune to their power because I know what the words mean and I am wizard enough to shape, direct, and control their power.
I have stated before that I don’t approve of insult humor (usually right before calling Trump a pumpkin-head, or otherwise insulting other members of the ruling Empire of Evil Idiots). And I don’t mean to shame others or make them feel belittled by my writing. But sometimes it happens and can’t be helped.
This blog isn’t about entertainment. I am not a stand-up comedian working on joke material. I use this blog as a laboratory for creating words and ideas. It is mostly raw material that I mean to shape into gemstones that can be used to decorate or structurally support my crown jewel novels. I use it to piece ideas together… stitch metaphors and bake gooseberry pies of unusual thinking. I use it to reflect on what I have written and what I have been working on. And sometimes, like today, I use it to reflect on how readers take what I have written and respond or use it for ideas of their own. That’s why I never reject or delete comments. They are useful, even when they are barbed and stinging. I made an entire post out of them yesterday.
I try hard myself to be tough in the face of hurtful words. You have to learn that essential Superman skill to be a middle school and high school teacher. It is there in those foundries for word-bullets that the most hurtful words are regularly wielded. The skill is useful for when you need the word bullets to bounce off you, especially if you are standing between the shooter and someone else. But I can never feel completely safe. Some words are kryptonite and will harm me no matter what I do. Some words you simply must avoid.
Anyway, there is my essay on hurtful words. If you want to consider all of that being my two cents on the matter… well, I probably owe you a dollar fifty-five.
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Filed under angry rant, blog posting, commentary, humor, Paffooney, strange and wonderful ideas about life, William Shakespeare, wisdom, word games, wordplay, writing humor
Tagged as humor, hurtful words, insult humor, resisting hurtful words