Seven words from Yagagriswold
Jun. 7th, 2012 08:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magidI commented on a seven-word post in her journal without saying whether I wanted words. I figured if they came, I'd write. And so they came, and so I write, on plum, hat, city, holy, craft, text, and barnacle.
Plums are an interesting fruit, coming in many varieties (not as many as apples, perhaps, but far more than other stone fruits I can think of) that are rather distinct from one another, but no one of them dominant in the market. The contrast between the smooth, somewhat thick skins and the juicy flesh beneath (if it's ripe; as a kid I always tended to prefer the harder underripe fruits, of all sorts, perhaps because the texture of crunch is so appealing) is unlike that of anything else. I tend to have a difficult time figuring out how best to make plums play with others in food; they just don't seem to lend themselves to easy combinations (in my mental mouth, anyway). There aren't many grown locally, so I often miss their season; perhaps if I find them this year I'll come up with new and exciting uses for them.
I've always liked hats, though for a long time I eschewed wearing them because of the implication in many Jewish circles that a woman wearing a hat is married. Not that this got me anywhere, so a couple of years ago when my crocheting focus turned from jewelry to hats, I started indulging myself and wearing my creations. Now most days I wear a hat when leaving the house, something that matches my outfit or suits my mood in some way. It still has the implication of marriedness in some places, but I enjoy expressing myself through my hats. It sometimes surprises me how many comments I get on them just as cool clothing, amplified when someone finds out that I made it. I've gotten used to the feeling of wearing something I've made, and I like that sense of satisfaction, that something I imagined turned into something real by my hands.
I grew up in a tending-towards-rural suburb, and the idea of a city meant many more opportunities (theater, bigger libraries, restaurants, sidewalks, public transit, etc.), but with an aura of danger. I'm not sure where that came from, since the city we lived closest to isn't particularly dangerous (perhaps my parents, as part of keeping-kids-safe, possibly reinforced by books that had interesting-yet-challenging plots in cities?), and since I graduated, have always lived in a city, relishing the benefits that come with population density. It has meant more expensive housing and a lack of land to use as I wish, but the benefits for me are far greater. More people means finding congenial folks who share my interests, though that also means being in a variety of different social groups. There are many opportunities (though I often don't take advantage of them, alas). It means being able to minimize using my car because I have other options. All this is because I'm lucky enough to live in a city that is reasonably well run, and integrated into the area around it, which is not something that happens without active choices in government. This is not true of all cities; there are many I can't imagine living in. However much the pastoral farm idea is pleasant as a thought-experiment, though, I think I will always prefer to live in a city.
Holy is complicated. There's those moments of awe about natural beauty or human ingenuity that make me feel that there is something more, something beyond, and also the sense that everything is interconnected. And there's the more traditional religious kind of holiness in space (Jerusalem, a sukkah) or time (Shabbat, holidays), in addition to the holiness of certain texts, immutable and divine.
Craft is a difficult word for me. As a verb, it is about skill and care in the making of something. As a noun, however, it's murkier. Is 'craft' the folksy other end of the spectrum from 'art'? Is it a hobby instead of a job, amateur instead of professional? Is it used as a way to put down the types of things traditionally made by women instead of those obviously-more-valuable contributions of men? Or is it more neutral than that? Context is everything, I suppose, but it's hard to ignore the potential connotations.
I'm going to consider text not as something I can do with my phone, but as language used to convey ideas. I find that I approach text very differently if it's in English (or French, for that matter) or in Hebrew. In English, I can appreciate flow of language, the ideas and style. In Hebrew, word choice involves different connotations, each word resonating within its word family, and with the other places it's used. There's also a Jewish focus on the integrity of texts, especially the Torah, fixed yet open to so many interpretations in every age.
I don't have a lot to say about barnacle. There were barnacles on rocks at some of the beaches I was at as a kid, and I know they can grow on the hulls of ships, but I don't think about them enough to have much of an reaction, other than perhaps metaphorically, in which case I think I have a lot of barnacles to deal with to get myself to better seaworthiness.
If you want to continue the game, I'm happy to give you seven words, but unless you state it explicitly, any comments are assumed to be on content only.
Plums are an interesting fruit, coming in many varieties (not as many as apples, perhaps, but far more than other stone fruits I can think of) that are rather distinct from one another, but no one of them dominant in the market. The contrast between the smooth, somewhat thick skins and the juicy flesh beneath (if it's ripe; as a kid I always tended to prefer the harder underripe fruits, of all sorts, perhaps because the texture of crunch is so appealing) is unlike that of anything else. I tend to have a difficult time figuring out how best to make plums play with others in food; they just don't seem to lend themselves to easy combinations (in my mental mouth, anyway). There aren't many grown locally, so I often miss their season; perhaps if I find them this year I'll come up with new and exciting uses for them.
I've always liked hats, though for a long time I eschewed wearing them because of the implication in many Jewish circles that a woman wearing a hat is married. Not that this got me anywhere, so a couple of years ago when my crocheting focus turned from jewelry to hats, I started indulging myself and wearing my creations. Now most days I wear a hat when leaving the house, something that matches my outfit or suits my mood in some way. It still has the implication of marriedness in some places, but I enjoy expressing myself through my hats. It sometimes surprises me how many comments I get on them just as cool clothing, amplified when someone finds out that I made it. I've gotten used to the feeling of wearing something I've made, and I like that sense of satisfaction, that something I imagined turned into something real by my hands.
I grew up in a tending-towards-rural suburb, and the idea of a city meant many more opportunities (theater, bigger libraries, restaurants, sidewalks, public transit, etc.), but with an aura of danger. I'm not sure where that came from, since the city we lived closest to isn't particularly dangerous (perhaps my parents, as part of keeping-kids-safe, possibly reinforced by books that had interesting-yet-challenging plots in cities?), and since I graduated, have always lived in a city, relishing the benefits that come with population density. It has meant more expensive housing and a lack of land to use as I wish, but the benefits for me are far greater. More people means finding congenial folks who share my interests, though that also means being in a variety of different social groups. There are many opportunities (though I often don't take advantage of them, alas). It means being able to minimize using my car because I have other options. All this is because I'm lucky enough to live in a city that is reasonably well run, and integrated into the area around it, which is not something that happens without active choices in government. This is not true of all cities; there are many I can't imagine living in. However much the pastoral farm idea is pleasant as a thought-experiment, though, I think I will always prefer to live in a city.
Holy is complicated. There's those moments of awe about natural beauty or human ingenuity that make me feel that there is something more, something beyond, and also the sense that everything is interconnected. And there's the more traditional religious kind of holiness in space (Jerusalem, a sukkah) or time (Shabbat, holidays), in addition to the holiness of certain texts, immutable and divine.
Craft is a difficult word for me. As a verb, it is about skill and care in the making of something. As a noun, however, it's murkier. Is 'craft' the folksy other end of the spectrum from 'art'? Is it a hobby instead of a job, amateur instead of professional? Is it used as a way to put down the types of things traditionally made by women instead of those obviously-more-valuable contributions of men? Or is it more neutral than that? Context is everything, I suppose, but it's hard to ignore the potential connotations.
I'm going to consider text not as something I can do with my phone, but as language used to convey ideas. I find that I approach text very differently if it's in English (or French, for that matter) or in Hebrew. In English, I can appreciate flow of language, the ideas and style. In Hebrew, word choice involves different connotations, each word resonating within its word family, and with the other places it's used. There's also a Jewish focus on the integrity of texts, especially the Torah, fixed yet open to so many interpretations in every age.
I don't have a lot to say about barnacle. There were barnacles on rocks at some of the beaches I was at as a kid, and I know they can grow on the hulls of ships, but I don't think about them enough to have much of an reaction, other than perhaps metaphorically, in which case I think I have a lot of barnacles to deal with to get myself to better seaworthiness.
If you want to continue the game, I'm happy to give you seven words, but unless you state it explicitly, any comments are assumed to be on content only.