Solipsism Is Not An Option

By Roy H. Barnacle

 

Breaking records is a relatively modern phenomenon. I don’t mean the kind that my children   break when they discover my collection of Frank Sinatra discs, but the achievement kind -- those that tell us how far behind the four minute mile we are, what a sound barrier used to be,  and  those that tell us that gold was once worth a mere $35 an ounce.

   

 Back then, almost every day my children read that someone has thrown, lifted, driven, sailed, hit, run, hit, run, jumped, leaped and flown something further, heavier, faster, farther, harder, and higher  than ever before. My children wanted in, to be part of the act.

  It started out in the most innocent way. It was just another gray winter morning. The stove had not yet reached the glow of warmth intended, and breakfast either had to be made, or was in the process of being so. Sharon descended upon my gray morning with a kiss on the cheek and  the announcement,

  “Do you realize that this is the first time I have kissed you, on the cheek, while you are sitting on the sofa, on the 9th of November?” Before I could challenge this assault upon my early morning reverie, she shot back, “It’s a new world record.”

   Since then, new world records have become ten a penny. One member of the family is tried to eleven a penny—another new world record. Kate is reached for the new record of how  many ways she could cycle to the library. I remember hoping that the record didn't include neighbors’ back yards. My eldest aimed at being the first to wear a dog out before she was worn  out. I don‘t think she made it. However that whole line of thinking set me off on a mental journey of my own.

  Wouldn’t it be really something if we could set records for loving and helping?

  Couldn’t our present records for kindness and compassion do with a little breaking?

  A friend said to me: “Try to do just one good thing each day, and you’d be surprised how it would make your day.” Well, it worked. It did indeed make my day, but why stop there? I, like my children, decided to set a few world records of my own. I’d like to be able to make an entire day one wholly good deed. Alas, like all attempts at record breaking, there’s a lot of training and a lot of perseverance to be accomplished. Mental record breaking is as hard as it's physical counterpart.

  What my children were showing me was that records and achievement also lie in the realm of the spirit. We too often think of breaking limits only in the physical world, in that gray mass under our skull,  yet we also exist in our heart and mind. These too can become limited and stilted if we do not set higher levels for their accomplishments.

  Talking about Englishmen at the height of the British Empire, E. M. Forster said, “They go forth into the world with well-developed bodies, fairly developed minds, and undeveloped hearts.” He said an undeveloped heart, not a cold one. Our senses are overqualified for their intended use.

  We pay very little attention to the subtle forms of expression all around us. We hear but do not listen. We look but do not see. We invent the most complex electronics machinery to relieve us of these  tiresome tasks, and it tells us nothing except that it is only a conglomeration of chips, silicon and silly games.

  Our senses are biologically and physically advanced and spiritually underemployed. There is all around us, a luminous and sonorous world. It is full of sights and sounds that have nothing to do with physical structures; it is limitless,full of records waiting to be broken.

  All of us are potential heirs to this world. No one has a monopoly on

  goodness of the heart, or the ability to see further than at present. To

  elevate our spirit by conscious endeavor is achievement indeed. And the

  present  record can be broken!

  Setting an achievement for our lighter tendencies can go a long way to eliminating

  humanity’s taste for cruelty and indifference.  If you can’t reach the goal you set for yourself, set one you CAN reach. The beautiful thing about a

  record, an aim, goal or personal achievement, is that it can always be broken, but never eliminated. There can be no limit on morality or humanness. The records we set for ourselves will always  be there.

   © Copyright 2001 Roy H. Barnacle. All rights reserved.

Pretend You Don't Read This

(or Nulla dies sine linea)

I was born a Cockney, complete with flat vowels,  dropped aitches and the bizarre transposition of "f's" and "th's." My father was quite content to let his son continue in this tradition, but my mother felt differently. She encouraged me to improve my speech and how I talked, reminding me that successful businessmen and army officers of rank spoke very well!   There were moments when I suspected it may have been more a gregarious admiration of the upper classes than any real sense of education of her son. Nevertheless by the time I had emigrated to the United States, I had acquired an acceptable (to Americans) accent.

But the leaving out of  syllables and whole blocks in the middle of words - it's still going on. "skeptism" for "skepticism,"   "barbituate" instead of "barbiturate" and so on. The one that makes me cringe the most is "partically" for "particularly."Good conversation -- and its sub-categories of sentence structure, syntax, speech labels and pronunciations, have, for some years, become a lost art. Ed Newman warned us about it for years. I remember a senior senator opposing a bill. He told us, without blush or stammer, that "we're going to finally wrestle to the ground this gigantic orgasm that is just out of control."  Huh?  The fact that he meant "organism"  does nothing to lessen the lack of grace in his statement. Okay, so Americans say "skejule" and the British say "shedyule," them "gararge" us "garridge" and so on. Those aren't mispronunciations, just a different language history.

Malcom X's wife announced her husband was "funeralized" my wife and I made a grab at the dictionary. (No, its not in there.........) That bastion of RP (Received Pronunciation) the BBC still haven't decided  wether is "CariBEEYan" or "CarRIBeyan", "Kenyah" or "Keenya"  and so on.

We can hardly protest the ignorance of today's students when those who decry the situation a aren't much better. Even Sarah Palin gets into the act with "refudiate." I remember qa foreign car maker telling us that its product was "The World's largest Van For Its Size.." 14 ounce pies contain "100% more chicken that it's 7 ounce pies." Duh!


With all this there are pro and con forces for an "official language. I am for a "President's English" that gives schools and academic institutions a base from which to work. Instead, what we have is the specious and odious PC movement, which is not an attempt to improve language and communication, but simply an attempt to control what people say.

It may not matter to most when you say "price" instead of "value" or "timid" instead of "shy" or "sensual" instead of "sensitive," and is certainly not a crime. Neither is expressing double negatives in sentences, but they point to a lack of awareness of just how important it is to express yourself accurately and precisely.  The right to express our individuality through speech is and almost distinct American trait. In education and in business, it is important to express yourself accurately and as precisely as you possible can.

Perhaps schools think with all that children have to learn today, there is no room to teach them how to speak correctly. Unlike many of the skills that have to be taught in the classroom, skills such as math and language can  be expressed very appropriately and fittingly in everyday contacts, in interrelationships, in ordinary and extraordinary ( or extraordinarily as some might say) communication.

BTW, my wife has just looked over my shoulder and said"OMG I hope you have written this perfect, because your readers will just fall all over you." LOL - did she mean "perfectly"?  And so it goes. But where?  If only people could speak proper like what I do!!