Monday, July 26, 2010

Molasses In January

Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly.

Mae West
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A certain poet once said that even if he knew every word in a dictionary it would still be a fascinating book to read. I have a Random House/Webster Unabridged dictionary and on long winter evenings I sometimes sit at my desk under the warm lamp, open it anywhere and read about words like absolutism, exiguous, homiletic, palimpsest and proleptic.

Why waste time with a big heavy dictionary? Why not just use Google? It's faster.
Because you have to know the word you're looking up before Google can help you and it doesn't give you a page of words with which to discover new ones.

I get ads and offers through AOL and others for gadgets and programs that will make my computer run faster. That's nice, but I don't want it to run faster. It operates a little bit faster than I do and that's fine with me.

Gandhi wrote "There is more to life than increasing its speed." It would seem to me that everyone is late for work, anxious to get home or rushing to get away from other people. There's an exit from the New York subway at Columbus Circle where the stairway makes a turn and there's a bit of the platform half way up, to the side of the stairs. I came up the stairs one morning with a whole mob of people. I stepped aside on that section of the stairway to let them pass. A moment later a young man joined me. I said to him "Everybody's in a big old hurry to get there." He laughed and said "Well I'm not." I replied "Neither am I." So the two of us stood and waited until the crowd was gone and then made a leisurely exit up the stairs and into the daylight.

Don't get me wrong. I think it's great that you can get from New York to LA in 6 hours and bask in 4, once you get on board the plane that is. I once waited 3 hours to board a 2 hour flight. But it isn't so much a matter of how long it takes to get there, it's a matter of what you going to do once there. You're probably going to iphone someone to tell them you arrived. Instant communication. Great stuff. But I enjoy taking my time, a few hours, to write something you're going to spend 2 minutes reading. That's okay with me. My pleasure is in the doing and it's worth doing slowly.

DB - The Vagabond
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SUMMER QUESTION
(This is not a contest.)

Who are the 2 (two) most important people alive today? Why?

Only 5 responses so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

Thank you.
DB
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5 comments:

pacifica62 said...

I used to know a lot of words I never seem to use anymore and for the most part have forgotten for lack of use. I am with you db. I tend to enjoy words like saunter, meander, mosey, browse, wander and dawdle. A slowed down version of life. Many times I, too, step aside to let the big city crowds pass lest I get trampled in the stampede. I don't mind waiting a few minutes cause I am not in a big hurry to get anywhere.

I'm mostly known as 'MA' said...

Everything I do now is at a slower pace and by being able to do so I find life so much more worthwhile. Taking the time just to sit outside and watch the birds is a blessing.

Anonymous said...

I learn the most unlikely things about myself when I wait quietly.
~Mary

salemslot9 said...

hmmm
I wonder what
Mae West was
referring to

I know

get your mind
out of the
gutter

lol

Ken Riches said...

Smelling the roses is a long lost art.