The word is.......

Good morning. This morning I am writing about words. Words, the use thereof. And the mode of their employ.

When I was at the Forum one Sunday morning a year or so ago, a young man raised his hand to ask if we might have a forum on the use of the Internet, specifically the e-mail system. He said that he personally knew of  three ended relationships, the  demise of which in each case might specifically be traced to communication on e-mail.  He was puzzled, and would have liked an airing on the subject.  I assume nobody expert enought to conduct this forum has come up, for as far as I know it has never happened.

We can say all manner of things orally, that careen and explode into the air in front of us. Even these have a great power. They have been the cause of  killings, revenges, broken spirits. But they have the blessing of disappearing in the course of the explosion--plus, everybody heard a different thing, it turns out. We do not hear what is said, often.

The written word is different. There it is, set in stone. Take it back as you will, someone can still come up with it and show it to you in front of your face. I write a lot of poems, from time to time, and ruefully wrote one entitled, " Do not write a love letter, write a poem."  And what we write on the Internet is read by whomever stumbles upon it. Including the FBI they tell me. (LOL)

Emoticons are vulgar, but they are necessary in the writing on the computer. The simplest jests can be misinterpreted. You must demonstrate your intent with a sign, it seems. A smile, :), means no harm intended. A wink, ;), a little more malice intended. You can put your electronically-compounded thoughts out there with a
bit more control over their intended effect.

In Foucault's Pendulum, Umberto Eco's protagonist notes the changed quality of his writing once a primitive word processor is introduced into his office. I note it too. I wrote a lot of stories on a giant IBM typewriter that I was fortunate enough to own. Those stories would not have been the same, written on a word-processor. Imagine, Jane Austen's writing would have been totally different had she not  been writing by hand. Perhaps it would have come out more like, "Emma: the musical," which I am going to see tonight at the Globe...;)....

I think I have more to say on this but will perhaps say it tomorrow. Right now, the Taterton is up and prowling.  I am not hungry, perhaps because I am full of humble pie.  I really am.  That is not an apology. It is an epiphany. YAZZYBEL