EMPTY WORDBOXES IN MY MIND

EMPTY WORDBOXES IN MY MIND

Seems like I'm often struggling for a word lately.

A word.

Just an ordinary word.

I know that it happens to the best of us but that doesn't make it any less disconcerting.

I get a picture in my head of going to a huge bank of small lockboxes or mailboxes. A key is in my hand, my arm reaches out to turn the lock and open the small compartment. I look inside but to my horror the space is empty! The word has vanished!

So then I circle around trying out synonyms - you know, green vegetable, looks like little trees - with the sound of confusion in my voice accompanied by just a touch of whining. Or perhaps I circle around and mentally reopen that word box hoping against hope that it will have reappeared but I peer into the recesses again and - nope - still gone. So I finish my thought lamely using a description or a synonym.

Other times I see the word as a tiny bird which rests in the wordbox as if on the branch of a tree. Just when I need it, the bird flies up and darts across my line of vision so fast I’m left with only a vague impression of it.  

It's so frustrating! Sometimes the word is there where I can find it but that only increases my unease when it's not. Maybe this isn’t the right key? the right box? And if not, where do I find it?

In the midst of complaining of not finding words when I need them, an interesting old Cockney word popped into my head – “scarpered” – that’s what’s happened, the word I need has scarpered!  What a great word!  I like the way it sounds when said out loud, and it suits the way I feel very well. The word I need has scarpered and left me suddenly and – it sometimes feels – with malice.

Sadly, I have come to fear those empty wordboxes so that it's often easier to abandon trying to verbalize my thoughts. I have found myself shaking my head and muttering "words… words".

That's why I like writing. I can take time to get the right word in the right place and no one knows if it took a dictionary or several returns to the wordbox to find it.

Speaking of which, where is my pen?  I’m hunting in the bottom of my purse and it seems to be gone. Like some weird outtake of a nursery rhyme …and the pen ran away with the word…

…done a bunk   vamoosed    skedaddled    scarpered…

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