The excruciating agony I feel when I start a sentence and place my insurmountably high hopes into how succinct, yet poignant it will sound, all for it to fall flat because I cannot think of a word I want to use for the life of me. There is no greater tragedy than finally getting your point across, only to discover you used the word “conceivable” an inconceivable number of times and you must now search the far reaches of the globe for a synonym that doesn’t make it obvious to your professor that you spent twenty minutes Googling, “conceivable synonyms.”
Taking lecture notes always devolves into my least favorite game: how many times can I use the same three words to make my sentences shorter for the sake of time but clearer for the sake of studying? Spelling errors on lecture notes have become a new language that only I am privy to (I have misspelled the names of every country in Europe and cannot be stopped). The “current times” (yes I’m sick of this phrasing, too, but guess who can’t come up with better words to use) have introduced a whole new set of sundry challenges brought to you by language.
Typing in that Zoom chat is such a dangerous game. Will I accidently start typing the words my classmates or professors are saying instead of the words in my brain? Will I spend far too much time attempting to configure the most precise summary of my thoughts only to finish at the exact moment another student simply speaks up and says all of what I had just typed up--only they did it better? Will I manage to misspell my very own name? Who can say? Not I.
Simply put, words are hard. That’s also what makes them fun, but because they give me so much grief, we’re not going to address that!
Sincerely,
Alicne Barkre
Alicen Barker
