The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows | 
#WeirdWordWednesday #WeirdWords
I had this word in mind so many times while I was in England on my vacation. So many people, so many different lives going on around me. ❤️
kairosclerosis
n. the moment you look around and realize that you‘re currently happy—consciously trying to savor the feeling—which prompts your intellect to identify it, pick it apart, and put it in context, where it will slowly dissolve until it‘s little more than an aftertaste.
For an instant, eyes
squeezed shut, I burned this moment
into memory.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
nodus tollens: the feeling that the plot of your life doesn‘t make sense to you anymore.
Nearly five years gone,
the merry-go-round from hell
still won‘t stop spinning.
Dunno about you all but it feels like my life crashed & burned right around the time the pandemic started. I feel like I‘ve been living in a Twilight Zone episode ever since!
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
plata rasa
n. the lulling sound of a running dishwasher, whose steady maternal shushing somehow puts you completely at peace with not having circumnavigated anything solo.
Steamy soap-scented
air wafts through the kitchen with
a whir and a hum.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
The lovely @AnnCrystal inspired me to get this adorable bumblebee journal for our #haikuhive — which also inspired todays haiku:
Busy bees buzzing,
collecting words like honey,
pollinating minds.
Thanks again @dabbe for putting this group together!! 🤗🤗🤗
#haikuaday #poetry
💛🐝🖤🐝💛🐝🖤🐝💛🐝🖤🐝💛🐝🖤🐝💛
jouska:
n. a hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head—a crisp analysis, a devastating comeback, a cathartic heart-to-heart—which serves as a kind of psychological batting cage that feels far more satisfying than the small-ball strategies of everyday life.
Dunno about you guys but I always have these convos in the shower - plan out the perfect argument & what I should have said.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
looseleft:
adj. feeling a sense of loss upon finishing a good book, sensing the weight of the back cover locking away the lives of characters you‘ve gotten to know so well.
My ode to a book hangover — who knew there was an actual word for this? So cool. (Nothing makes me feel a book hangover more than when I finish my Harry Potter reread every year or two!)
Take me back to that
magical world within your
pages — I‘m adrift.
#haikuhive
énouement: the bittersweetness of having arrived here in the future, seeing how things turn out, but unable to tell your past self.
I‘m coming at this perspective wishing I could tell this to my younger self.
You won‘t hear me, but
they don‘t love you. And you are
so much more than them.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
occhiolism: the awareness of how fundamentally limited your senses are—noticing how little of your field of vision is ever in focus, how few colors you‘re able to see, how few sounds you‘re able to hear, how intrusively your brain fills in the blanks with its own cartoonish extrapolations—which makes you wish you could experience the whole of reality instead of only ever catching a tiny glimpse of it, to just once step back from the keyhole…
Today‘s word is onism.
Onism: the frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time.
My mind floats away
but my body can‘t escape.
I‘m trapped here with you.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
It‘s Friday so why not do 2 words today? 😆
“scabulous
adj. proud of a certain scar on your body, which is like an autograph signed to you by a world grateful for your continued willingness to play with her, even if it hurts.
From scab + fabulous.”
Referring to scars on my back from a car accident*
Worn like a badge, these
stripes are a reminder of
the strength I possess.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #haiku #DOOS
Today‘s word is trumspringa: the longing to wander off your career track in pursuit of a simple life — tending a small farm in a forest clearing, keeping a lighthouse on a secluded atoll, or becoming a shepherd in the mountains — which is just the kind of hypnotic diversion that allows your thoughts to make a break for it & wander back to their cubicles in the city.
Oh would that I could
stash myself away in a
cottage full of books.
#haikuhive
Today‘s word is chrysalism.
Chrysalism: the amniotic tranquility of being indoors during a thunderstorm.
Mesmerized by each
drop, warmth steals over me as
the storm rages on.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
Today‘s word is kenopsia.
Kenopsia: the atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet.
Abandoned amusement park —
Echoes of laughter
float lazily on the breeze:
ghosts of yesterday.
#haikuhive #haikuaday #poetry #DOOS
I picked up this lovely dictionary from a bookstore in Atlanta while on a road trip with my sister a few years ago. An excerpt from page 1: “The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows is a compendium of new words for emotions. Its mission is to shine a light on the fundamental strangeness of being a human being — all the aches, demons, vibes, joys & urges that are humming in the background of everyday life.”
I decided to use this book as inspiration ⬇️
pickDidn‘t make a #36by36 update yesterday, so here‘s a twofer. I finished The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows on Monday. Nick Allen would love this book. 🖊️ I am glad I read it and am actually surprised that these are not “actual” words because I have found myself relating to so many of these, some frighteningly specific to my own experience. I hope to own it at some point in print because a lot of these concepts deserve further introspection. ⬇️
Yesterday was full of bowling and Mario Kart as Sundays tend to be 😄 So I didn‘t finish any books but I am halfway through The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows which I am enjoying as much as everyone who has recommended it thinks I will! I also found a Kensington edition of Pucking Wild at my library so I started Tess and Ryan‘s bonus epilogue yesterday too. 🥹 Almost to the midpoint of this challenge. #36by36
Night Sky book cover prompt. This book is going to be on my November TBR as well. #HauntedShelf #SkeletonCrew
A couple new books for the shelf ? the dictionary of obscure sorrows was referenced in Amanda Montell's "The Age of Magical Overthinking" that I listened to a little while back.
This is my Mother's day present from my daughter. It is the coolest book! A compendium of new words for emotions.
When she read the first quote she knew it was a book for me
"I read the dictionary. I thought it was a poem about everything. " Steve Wright.
Yes I read it as a child?
#litsylove
Just finished The Book of Cold Cases. Now on to my 3rd book of the yr already. Crushing it!!! 😜🤓📚
Prompt - kid # 1 picks
I love doing my #BookishMonopoly
It keeps it fun and non-stop.
idlewild - adj. feeling grateful to be stranded in a place where you can't do much of anything-sitting for hours at an airport gate...which temporarily alleviates the burden of being able to do anything at any time and frees up your brain to do whatever it wants to do, even if it's just to flicker your eyes across the passing landscape. From Idlewild, the original name of John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City.
pickThis book is a journey through completely bizarre yet weirdly common experiences of the human condition. It attempts to put some of our common thoughts and emotions into words. Some definitions are brief and to the point. Others are short essays that explore the feeling more deeply. Parts are quite poetic and just makes me want to create.
I had this expectation, picking up this book, that I would feel real validated (because misery loves company), but instead…its like every time I read a new word, it would bring up a memory. Painful ones, fun ones, ones I had forgotten. Such a pleasant surprise!
Belated Weekly Report.
I've finished Salt Crystals and have started reading a few other books. The Hidden Palace for bookclub, Doctor Thorne, and of course there is the every present Clarissa. Tagged book is not pictured, but is a pleasant interlude from the others.
pick⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Highly recommend this book about words. The author provides an enlightening perspective on how to view the world and never be afraid to expand your horizons.
#bestseller #nytimes
"It's up to you. A word is only real if you want it to be."
Enjoying an afternoon at my local coffee shop ☕️
Two lovely gifts arrived today. The tagged book, on the right, from my birthday fairy sister @KarenUK and what a beautiful book it is! I can see myself dipping in to it a lot in the next few days. Thank you so much, Karen 😘
The book on the left looks terrific, some wonderful mid C20th women writers. I am guessing it comes from you @LeahBergen Am I right?
This quote is in the front of this book I just began! Seems perfect for a chilly fall evening in the Texas Panhandle! I‘m not working tonight! Choosing to read something not work related! Yay for me!
pickLooseleft, ozurie, indosentia, foilsick, etherness, dorgone, sitheless, kenaway, silience, innity, wenbane, aulasy, enterhood, morii, yu yi, ellipsism, craxis, evertheless: these are just some of the words Koenig invented to name feelings that until now never had one.
Except for a dictionary of new words, the book is a collection of truths, fears and nostalgia. It leaves me a bit sad but I am grateful I read it thanks to the lovely @KarenUK 🤍
so-soI liked a lot of these words, but a lot of them were also terribly corny, and would never past muster with a lexicographer. Koenig often takes two words from completely different languages and blends them together, which is a big no-no. For me, it's much more rewarding to find an obscure word that already exists than to read Koenig's made-up words, especially when he blatantly throws all the rules of language out the window.
