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Our Twisted Way Of Speaking

By Tommy Clarkson

 

awkwardedIt would “appear” as quite obvious, to those who know me, that I like to play with words. Accordingly - in an attempt to, again, apply logic to our English language - if that lack of awareness, on their part, were to go away, said cognition would “disappear.” Thus, does not sound logic dictate that if I were to not “play” with words, I’d then be “displaying?

As now noted, the object of today’s prattling is the prefix “dis” . . . and “dat” is a fact!

We can lovingly “agree” or passionately “disagree”. We may “establish” something but later decide to “disestablish” it. We “arm” and “disarm” for wars. We “connect” with folks and then – a few bad experiences later - we “disconnect”. We “regard” ourselves to have good intentions only to “disregard” our doctor’s advice about our favorite bad habits. We “charge” and then, with a literal, figurative or financial bang, we “discharge”.

I’d be “disappointed” if this all were not so patently obvious to us all! (But, if I wasn’t would I have been merely “appointed”? And, if so, to what by whom?)

Perhaps as parents, at a time or two when a daughter was an hour or more late in meeting her “be home by” curfew, we may have been somewhat “distraught”. However, for the life of me I don’t remember being consciously “traught” before such. And, if there is a “distinct” possibility that may not have been, then what is the condition of “tinct”?

Increasingly, getting my mental arms around this seems to be a bit of a “disaster” –apparently, preceded by a blissful condition of “aster”? Maybe we should just commence “discarding” these ruminations and get along with “carding” our lives. (Which, by the way, probably happened to no few of us when trying to buy beer back in high school?)

But “disjointed” nostalgia notwithstanding, let us make a “joint” effort to get a handle on this “dis” deal. We understand: please/displease; continue/discontinue; favor/disfavor; gorge/disgorge; infect/disinfect; mount/dismount; prove/disprove; order/disorder; parity/disparity; organize/disorganize; integrate/disintegrate; lodge/dislodge; place/displace and the good old stand-bys of like/dislike.

So, as we read these printed words and begin to feel a degree of “closure” to understanding this confusion, “disclosure” must be raising its ugly head when the following come to mind: cuss/discuss; gust/disgust; patch/dispatch; tend/distend; tort/distort; and tract/distract. (Did I “miss” something when learning to read and write or should I just give up and consider “dismissing” these convoluted ponderings?)

Now, have these strange thoughts caused a bit of “discord” and “dispute” in your life? If so I heartedly apologize. Please go back to your normal, day to day, “cord” and “pute.”

I “disregard” any “regard” for further elucidation, elaboration or mental convulsions and “solve” this confusion by dissolving any further discussion.