Category Archives: Language

Fourthgraders

Posted on October 25, 2018 by John Swinburn

On occasion, I slog through writing I’ve posted here or stored in directories on my hard drive. I’m looking for words that have merit, writing of which I might one day be proud. I’m afraid I rarely find those gems … Continue reading →

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Of Words and Weather and Automotive Maturation

Posted on August 1, 2018 by John Swinburn

Uncharacteristically cool temperatures for late July and early August give me hope. Soul-crushing hot weather tends to sear despair into my brain, but the scar heals quickly when evening and early morning temperatures dip into the sixties. Were it not … Continue reading →

Posted in Cars, Language, Politics, Rambling, Stream of Consciousness, Weather | Leave a comment

Psycholinguistic Musings

Posted on April 27, 2017 by John Swinburn

Sinew. That word can evoke, for me, images of sturdy steel bands, thick in the middle but narrowing almost to points on the ends; ribbons of metallic lies constrained at either end by truth. It’s as if truth confines the streamer of … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Philosophy, Ruminations, Writing | 1 Comment

A Roundabout Tribute to Maggie Roche

Posted on January 24, 2017 by John Swinburn

I’m a fervent admirer of a handful of musicians. People who know me may understand the depth of my admiration for Leonard Cohen, whose deeply meaningful poetry set to music moves me beyond anyone else’s art. Yet, even in the … Continue reading →

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Linguafile

Posted on December 30, 2016 by John Swinburn

An idea for a story came to me during a conversation with my wife yesterday. The story would have been a whimsical one in which a young boy dreams of becoming fluent in every human language and, by working hard, … Continue reading →

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A Turn of Phrase

Posted on December 22, 2016 by John Swinburn

I suspect this is the sixth or seventh time I’ve written about the French phrase, Le jeu n’en vaut pas la chandelle, translated into English as “the game is not worth the candle.” The phrase sums up feelings of depression … Continue reading →

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Ensteubulous Thursday

Posted on December 1, 2016 by John Swinburn

Soft, early morning light filtered through the windows when I woke up this morning, a highly unusual circumstance for someone who’s up well before dawn almost every day. Why I slept in is beyond me. But sleep in I did. … Continue reading →

Posted in Food, Language | 1 Comment

Negative Space

Posted on November 3, 2016 by John Swinburn

Negative space. That’s an interesting concept. The term refers to the space around and between one or more subjects of a visual image; it’s the space that surrounds an image. To an artist—and others who understand the concept in an … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Art, Language, Literature | Leave a comment

The Cleansing

Posted on September 23, 2016 by John Swinburn

Certain words convey meanings that dictionary definitions do not adequately express. One such word , in my humble opinion, is “boisterous.” A group of pre-school children might be called boisterous. But the word is inappropriate to describe a gang of violent … Continue reading →

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Blood

Posted on July 11, 2016 by John Swinburn

Some words occupy spaces only they can fill.  Those words are like surviving twins; they are incomplete pairs that cannot be repaired, no matter how much energy is expended to that end. One such word is blood. Oh, one might … Continue reading →

Posted in Just Thinking, Language | 1 Comment

Letters and Numbers

Posted on May 18, 2016 by John Swinburn

What gives me reason to think I can stitch together a small sample of all the available words in the English language to create something new? Any word I might choose to use has been used before, very probably in concert … Continue reading →

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Petrichor

Posted on April 29, 2016 by John Swinburn

There’s a word for the smell of fresh rain, an aroma that evokes memories of my childhood better than any other. The word is petrichor, derived from the Greek words petra (stone) and ichor (the blood of the gods), coined … Continue reading →

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A Single Word Can Change Everything

Posted on April 10, 2016 by John Swinburn

I stumbled upon an interesting bit of wordplay this morning, courtesy of a writer-directed Facebook post. Here it is: She told him that she loved him. The post went on to say that by inserting the word ‘only’ in various places, … Continue reading →

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Unutterable

Posted on March 30, 2016 by John Swinburn

It has come to my attention that the French language is far more difficult for me to understand than I had earlier imagined. My mouth is not properly configured to speak, nor are my ears constructed to hear, the sounds … Continue reading →

Posted in Absurdist Fantasy, Language | 2 Comments

Two Hundred

Posted on July 19, 2015 by John Swinburn

Poetry can utter thoughts one dare not say aloud, nor commit to prose, because poetry is a language of suggestion, interpretation, influence. “It means what it means to you” or “It means what you want it to mean.” That vague avoidance of … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Poetry, Writing | 2 Comments

Only So Far…

Posted on July 5, 2015 by John Swinburn

The difference between fear and terror is one of intensity and effect. Fear is authoritative. Terror is dominant. Fear generates a response. Terror triggers panic. Fear leads to action. Terror results in paralysis. Consider, as well, the difference between liking and loving. … Continue reading →

Posted in Just Thinking, Language | 2 Comments

And on other matters…

Posted on June 27, 2015 by John Swinburn

It seems one of my favorite phrases, “slogging through the porridge,” belongs only to me. I have used it only once in my blog (that I can find), but it escapes my lips in conversation not infrequently and it has … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Welding, Writing | Leave a comment

Caramel Floods

Posted on June 9, 2015 by John Swinburn

Soft and thick like flash-cooled caramel, my thoughts creep along in slow motion, their hard edges dragged around obstacles that get in their way by the more pliable core within. Thinking is, at times, an exercise in  patience. When the mind … Continue reading →

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Un Qualunque Mattino

Posted on May 17, 2015 by John Swinburn

Some of my favorite tunes are by Gianmaria Testa, an Italian singer-songwriter. I do not understand the words to any of his music because I do not speak Italian, but I think I understand the emotions of the music. Still, I wish I … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Music | 4 Comments

I Should Have Sawn This Coming

Posted on April 5, 2015 by John Swinburn

The complexity of the world around us is staggering.  It’s not enough that we must be capable of acknowledging and recognizing the incalculably vast differences between butterflies and locomotives. No, we have to distinguish between components of each of them, and of … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Tools | 1 Comment

Skin in the Game

Posted on March 23, 2015 by John Swinburn

Here’s how it happened: I went looking for the etymology of “skin in the game.” What I found was a set of words that describe some concepts I never knew existed or, at least, I’d never thought about. A word exists, I learned, … Continue reading →

Posted in Language | 2 Comments

Scientific Inquiry

Posted on March 20, 2015 by John Swinburn

The older I get, the more I appreciate the magnificence of scientific inquiry and the more I appreciate its civility. Science and politics are worlds apart, one populated by people who strive to understand the world, the other by a … Continue reading →

Posted in Language, Science | 2 Comments

The Ides of March

Posted on March 15, 2015 by John Swinburn

In my opinion, the primary reason we know the ides of March is that Shakespeare incorporated the phrase “beware the ides of March” into Julius Caesar, a soothsayer’s warning to Caesar. His impending assassination by Brutus and Cassius would take place on … Continue reading →

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Trends in Benign Neglect

Posted on January 31, 2015 by John Swinburn

I read something not long ago  in which the term “benign neglect” was used.  My memory tells me it was used to describe a suggested policy in which improvements in education would occur if the State would just stop investing time and … Continue reading →

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The Trouble with Words

Posted on January 28, 2015 by John Swinburn

Komorebi, as I came to learn recently, is a Japanese word meaning sunlight filtering through tree leaves.  If I am to properly describe the dim, non-illuminated areas on a wall next to the komorebi coming through the window, I need a … Continue reading →

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