If you’ve been around for a while, you know that this blog used to be my home for deep reflection, faith, and the occasional existential crisis disguised as self-help.
Well… we’re taking a slight detour. Let’s call this the“midlife crisis of content.”
Same curiosity, same heart, but with more humor, more history, and more of life’s absurdities. Basically, it’s still me… but with a few more punchlines (or Dad jokes) and fewer life lessons. So pour yourself a coffee (or something more substantial), and let’s begin.
Let’s start with a confession: I am not a linguist,
an etymologist, or anything remotely resembling a literary scholar. I’m just a
guy who loves words, and occasionally launches bottle rockets with more
enthusiasm than precision.
My relationship with language is basically my relationship
with fireworks: I don’t fully understand how it works, but I’m fascinated by
how it lights up the sky (and occasionally singes my eyebrows).
Now, once I research something, digest it, and write about
it, it sticks. I may not be a literary genius, but I’m a decent note-taker (even
better with the speech-to-text feature) with Wi-Fi and a bottomless sense of
wonder.
For the first fifteen years of my professional career, I taught middle school social studies in Catholic schools. A noble calling somewhere between The Dead Poets Society and Lord of the Flies. I wasn’t a “read-the-textbook-and-test-on-Friday” kind of teacher. I liked to dig deeper. I wanted the rest of the story.
My curriculum wasn’t built on the Dead Sea scrolls, but rather a holy
trinity of unconventional wisdom from:
- Mental
Floss
- Uncle
John’s Bathroom Reader
- Virtually
anything by Bill Bryson
- Kenneth
Davis (You Don’t Know Much About…)
- A
sprinkle of Lies My Teacher Told Me, and a dash of pure curiosity, and you’ve got my teaching philosophy: make it fun, make it stick, and
if possible, make it rhyme.
Because English, as it turns out, is less of a language and
more of a centuries-long prank pulled by monks, French invaders, and
bored scribes with too much ink and not enough supervision. Somewhere around the 14th century, a medieval
scribe probably woke up and thought: “You know what the word knight
needs? A completely unnecessary ‘k.’”
His buddy, likely named Geoffrey (because of course he was),
nodded and added: “Brilliant! Let’s pronounce it nite. That’ll confuse
the peasants for centuries!”
And thus, chaos was born. We’ve been living under the tyranny of silent letters ever since; words that look like they lost a fight in a Scrabble barroom brawl:
Knife.
Knee.
Gnat.
Gnome.
And don’t even get me started on colonel. That’s not
a word; that’s a dare. You can almost hear the ghosts of English
teachers past whispering, “Sound it out, dear,” while Colonel
smirks, “You’ll never figure me out, Sparky!”
I’ve read enough about the Great Vowel Shift (which,
spoiler alert, was neither great nor exceptionally organized) to know that at
some point, English had a midlife crisis and decided to spell “through” seven
different ways. And yet… I love it. Every weird word, every rebellious letter,
every phonetic betrayal carries a story.
English is a museum of linguistic mischief, every word a relic of cultural collisions and human stubbornness. So no, I’m not an expert. I’m just an enthusiast with a full cup of Chai, an incurable curiosity, and an unhealthy relationship with dictionary.com.
These days, most of my life is spent in the Principal’s
Office, which means I have plenty of time to ponder the Latin roots of detention.
When I’m not wrangling students or OCEF paperwork, I still love to teach: through
this blog, around a campfire with a cold adult beverage, or with anyone I can
hold captive long enough to spin a tale.
Because learning should never end. And if it does, well…
that’s when the silent letters win.
Epilogue: Somewhere out there, a medieval monk
is laughing in his grave every time we spell “Wednesday.” And honestly? He
deserves it.
Next week: “Mary
Had a Little Scam: The Sinister Origins of Nursery Rhymes (and Other Ways We
Accidentally Traumatize Toddlers).”
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