I’ve been reading Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World, in which Bob Goff encourages us all to stop philosophizing about love and to go do love.
I first heard about Bob Goff in Don Miller’s book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, and it was there that I learned of Bob’s love of whimsy. Bob thinks the world would be a better place if we all embraced whimsy. He says in Love Does:
I’ve come to understand more about faith as I’ve understood more about whimsy. What whimsy means to me is a combination of the “do” part of faith along with doing something worth doing. It’s whimsey that spreads hope like grass seed in the wind. Whimsy reminds me of the Bible, too, when it talks about stuff being like an aroma. It’s not an overpowering one, just something that has the scent of God’s love, an unmistakable scent that lingers.
The dictionary defines it like this:
playfully quaint or fanciful behavior or humor
I love the concept of whimsy, and all things whimsical. I always have.
But the word makes me cringe.
It hasn’t always. Whimsy (the word, not the idea) and I were on great terms until 2005, when my son was diagnosed with cancer. When we first spotted the problem with our son, we headed to our family doctor. He suspected a rare form of cancer–and he turned out to be right–but he’d never seen a case himself and didn’t want to make the diagnosis; he referred us to a specialist to confirm his suspicion.
My friend had met this specialist before. “I don’t know how to describe him, exactly,” she said, “He’s an odd bird. Unusual. Whimsical.”
The specialist was unusual, as promised. More than unusual: he seemed straight out of Alice in Wonderland. Everything about him was exaggerated. He was tall and thin, with hipster glasses and a bow tie. When he spoke, his pitch rose too high, then fell too low, all in the same sentence.
He moved through the tiny exam room as if on a dance floor, bending from the waist at a cartoonish angle to peer into our baby’s eyes for just a few seconds. He swooshed over to consult with his resident, whispering and gesturing in hushed tones, then he swooped back to us to deal the devastating blow with a theatrical flourish: our son had final stage retinal cancer, it was possibly already in the brain, and if it was, he would die.
The man wasn’t whimsical. He was a cartoon, but I still can’t shake the association between him and that word. I love whimsy, the concept, but the word has been ruined. I’d like to reclaim it one day.
But I’m not there yet.
What word has been ruined for you? How do you go about reclaiming it?
I feel like I’ve lost any “whimsy” (Not the word, but the actual being whimsy) I had, and I’m not totally sure why (it could be the influence of my ISTJ husband who is very ST). I can already tell I’m going to feel uncomfortable reading about whimsy when I get this book!
I think some words that have been ruined for me are “interesting”, “amazing”, and some others I can’t bring to mind right now, because they are SO overused (usually on Facebook). Unfortunately, I can’t quite break the habit of using “interesting” and it bothers me when I use it.
Also, what happened with your son? My heart just dropped when I read “final stage retinal cancer”. I didn’t even know there was such a thing as retinal cancer!
Kelly, my go-to words are “interesting” and “fascinating.” I don’t mean to overuse them, but there’s just so much interesting and fascinating stuff out there!
I didn’t know there was such a thing as retinal cancer either. And my first reaction was that it didn’t sound so bad, as far as cancers go, but it turns out that your eyes are smack up against your brain, and the brain is a bad place to have cancer. But we treated it successfully, and he’s doing fine now. But cancer sucks even if you come out okay: the side effects are lasting and no fun. But hey, I’ll take it.
That’s a very interesting comment.
Oh! Just thought of another one: thing/things. (except when playing the game of things…very, very fun!). Another one I see too often is “random”.
I am glad your son turned out ok; I can’t imagine how scary that must have been.
I never really liked “whimsy” just because it sounds mildly unpleasant, like a cross between “whine” and “flimsy”, and is often used to describe things that I would describe as “supposed to be fun but just don’t do it for me.” I certainly can see why your experience ruined the word for you!
“Joy” has been tainted for me since a woman with that name got me fired from a job by lying about me to the boss behind my back while being oh so sweet to my face. It’s been 14 years, but I still flinch a little whenever I hear that word.
Oh, that’s sad. I love the word joy, and would be very upset to lose it. But I think something like that would taint it for me too.
Ruined words? Not whimsical, although if I had your experience I’d probably never want to hear it again. I’m so glad your son recovered. You know that old saying about “That which does not kill us … “? I have taken to finishing the sentence with “… can still hurt an awful lot!”
For me, a word that grates now is “corroborate.” Years ago when I was still practicing law I was in a deposition and asked the wtiness if he had any corroborating evidence. His attorney insisted that I misused the word and obviously didn’t know its definition. Nothing whimsical about his statement either. I still use the word occasionally, but not without remembering the incident. No idea why it had stayed with me for 20 years, but it does. Words and their uses are funny that way.
Tim
I like your adaptation to the old saying, because you’re absolutely right.
After your experience I can understand why “whimsy” is ruined for you.
I’ve got some very negative church experiences in my background, and a number of words are at least somewhat tainted. However, “fellowshipping” or “fellowship” is completely ruined for me.
“Fellowship” sounds pretty okay to me, and I’m trying to imagine what ruined it for you. But I know that any word can be ruined. I have a friend who counts “community” as one of her ruined words. If that word can be ruined, any word can be.
The church I grew up in just used that word all. the. time. Every week probably there would be some announcement at least, or comments in the sermon about “fellowshipping with the brethren.” And my overall experience with that church is so negative (it’s been considered a cult), so that the word immediately reminds me of them and all the other negative connotations goes along with it.
Because it was only fellowshipping and they were only brethren if they were also part of that specific denomination. Because if you left that denomination you were an outcast. Because no one else in the world had it right.
Blergh. Not life-threatening, but still gross.
It’s not a word, but the phrase “Reinvent the wheel” drives me nuts. I was consistently told by a former boss not to reinvent the wheel, but to just copy what other accounts were doing in a very condescending and blithe manner. It fried me every time, because the programs and formats he referred me to were completely out of our league – big, expensive, labor intensive and way beyond the reach of our tiny, struggling account. It was his way of avoiding issues he didn’t want to deal with and I still can’t bear to say or hear the phrase.