A Jumble of Thoughts

Today I have no set agenda. No list of complaints or injuries against me.

Just a jumble of ideas, which reflects my current mindframe.

Today I see a nurse practitioner here on campus to see whether I have ADHD or not. Yes, I realize that I am not obligated to take any medications they prescribe me, and yes I realize that it doesn't matter if I have an attention deficit. But I would like to have proof if I do indeed have an attention deficit. I don't know about you, but it'd be a great relief to have a little piece of paper at my disposal that says "No this person isn't stupid, she just has trouble focusing. Look, she's even diagnosed!"

The appointment is at 2. I can feel my hands shaking. I can't say whether that's nervousness, hunger, or low blood sugar. But considering I had those Ritz cracker munchies with peanut butter between them and Hershey's milk chocolate kisses not too long ago....It's probably the former.

I hope I don't act like an idiot.

I have an interesting classmate. He's an English major, like myself, and very interesting to talk to. I go out of my way to walk places that I don't need to walk to just so I can prolong conversations with him. I get the feeling that if the campus was large enough to have a...walk through the park we would take it just to have...philosophical discussions. For a lack of a better term.

We take Linguistics together. And try to meet at least once a week to do homework together. I'm not sure he gets anything out of this deal: his wife works on things with him at home and he's much more together than I am. And I'M the one with the procrastinating/not doing homework in general problem. But we have good off-topic discussions and still get homework done.

And he makes me laugh.

Or my making him laugh makes me laugh. I'm not sure. I feel like a behemoth, though. Stumbling through the English world with two huge left feet, and he makes me feel okay about myself. Surprisingly enough. I stutter, I stumble, and I forget what the heck I was talking about...But I make him laugh and enjoy himself and that makes me ecstatic.

So today I awkwardly admitted that I might possibly be a writer (I know I know: Denial is not just a river) and he didn't look at me funny, laugh, or make fun of me. He just said "Yes," in that patient tone of his. "And?"

So recently I've been having this lovely problem. I'll know EXACTLY which word I want to use. I build the sentence specifically for this word, have the tense and aspect in mind (ask a linguistics major what that means), and know the exact definition of the word. On a good day I might even remember the first letter as well.

But for the LIFE of me, I cannot recall which word it is! It drives me nuts! Do you know how you can tell when someone overuses a word and uses the thesaurus to "insert a better one"? Well when this annoying thing happens (at least 2 or 3 times a day) I have to insert a different word as a placeholder, or restructure the entire thought for a lesser word.

Which pisses me off.

So I've taken to (instead of the placeholder words) writing in parenthesis the definition of the word I want, and the first letter.

Then I ask that classmate of mine. Now this is sad: We study, we talk, we sit next to each other, we walk...I still can't remember his name >.<

But he's a font of information. When I asked him if Principé was a real word, he could tell me yes. When I brought up the word scion he told me exactly how to say it. He's the one who believed me when I said that 'hist' was a real word and stood there chuckling when I looked it up in the dictionary and lo and behold! It was there!

So I told him about my placeholder words and the parenthesis and he offered his help. That wonderful wonderful man. I am forever indebted. And he'll never get away! *laughs manically*

So I brought him one of my problems. I said, "Look, I need a word that means take apart, analyze, starts with a D, and has to fit the sentence "He'll tear himself apart for hours (blank)ing my nod, and my expression""

He got it in one. Deconstruction! I knew it was the word. I knew it would fit. It was exactly what I wanted from the beginning. But it just...fluttered away like a butterfly. And I HATE that I have all these amazing words that I know how to use and don't get to because of my faulty memory. Makes me feel stupid, and that I use plain words much too often.

Sometimes I'll remember on my own. For instance I had difficulties with another D word.

"Lucius doesn't let himself (think, waste time, debate) on why he's on Harry Potter's doorstep" (don't ask, btw)

Two days later I thought of the word DWELL.

OMG! It fits perfectly.

So I have a brain (which means I have one up on that scarecrow man), but it has holes in it like a sieve, obviously.

URGH.

Also, I needed to know about fragments and incomplete sentences. They've been bugging me, but I haven't been able to ask my linguistics Professor about them because I couldn't remember what they were called.

So today I asked that classmate (bless him) and he didn't even twitch when I tried to say "un-complete" sentences.

So I asked Dr. Paraskeva's (with the man at my side) whether they were okay for non-academic writing, and whether this particular one worked: "To the absolute delight of his classmates."

She was absolutely tickled pink. Fluttered around excitedly for a bit, showed me an article on how fragments could be used as idioms (a new idea I learned just today) and shoved me out the door exclaiming about how that sentence was perfect.

I think she was a little taken aback on my word problem though. The classmate said it might be because of my drive, that my drive is unusual.

Drive? What drive? The drive to find the perfect word I wanted in the first place? I never have doubts about what I want. It's just not always THERE, so then I have to go on a wild goose chase for the blasted thing.

Well I wanted to say more...But I have that appointment in 5 minutes so I'll wrap this up in a part two afterwords. (I always thought that afterward went to afterwards, I learnt otherwise just yesterday)

Regards from Purgatory,
Monica