Briefly: I started a new book last night, one that's been on my shelf for a while: More Than Words: Contemporary Writers and the Works that Shaped Them. From the title you may be able to tell that it is a collection of essays about significant works in these writer's lives. The book was compiled by Philip Yancy, and I'm really enjoying it so far. I can't wait to see what Madeleine L'Engle has to say about George McDonald, since I've given up on reading anything by him for the moment.
Don't think the starting of a new book means I've finished any of the ones I previously started. I don't know what it is that gets inside my head and compells me to read up to six different things at once.
When I talked to my brother on the phone this morning he said that he was alright. I interrupted him at this point and asked him, what does that mean exactly? We generally use it to mean that we are doing not too poorly, but not exactly brilliantly either. "Alright" sounds like it means that everything in your life is right. But there's only one "l" in alright he reminded me. So maybe "alright" is actually a contraction of "almost right." We don't really know much about prefixes, he contributed.
It's just a thought.
13 comments:
Kelly Kelly Kelly! I think I found a gramatical error in your post! I only point it out because I know you would it to be corrected. :)You said "...doing not to poorly..." I believe you meant "...doing not too poorly..."
I love that you and Daniel had that discussion! Very Bishop-like.
Interesting discussion, considering that "alright" was on a list of common misspellings that my 8th grade English teacher distributed. According to her, "alright" is not a word; it is a misspelling of "all right" in the same way that "thru" is a misspelling of "through."
Here's the entry at m-w.com
http://m-w.com/dictionary/alright
Thanks for looking that up for me, Jim. I have one quarrel with this entry; it doesn't tell us what the heck the word is *supposed* to mean! All, literally all, is well, or some things aren't as perfect as they could be? What do *you* mean when you say you're *alright*?
Anna, it was more of a typographical error than a grammatical error, but you are correct, it absolutely will be fixed. What do *you* mean when you say you're *alright*.
Maybe someone ought to look this up in the OED.
The online version of the OED has no entry for "alright." The entry for "all right" is here:
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/allright
I think most of the time for me "alright" means something similar to "okay" meaning that everything is not necessarily bad, but it isn't great either. Which can me good or bad depending on my tone.
Oh, I forgot to tell you what *I* mean when I use the word "all right." I mean nothing. The term is a throw-away word. If it has any meaning at all, it is this, "You just asked me how I am doing, and I either do not believe that you are actually interested in a genuine answer to that question, or else I do not what to give you a genuine answer to that question, or else I am stalling until I can formulate a genuine answer to that question."
Have I ever asked you how you were? What did you answer? And then what did you mean by it?
I'll be sure to pay closer attention next time.
(backpedaling like crazy) Uhh, let me modify my answer a bit. Another meaning behind "all right" in response to "How are you?" is that "How are you?" is merely an American greeting, not a real question. And, "all right" is one of the accepted return greetings, along with "Fine, how are you?"
This is really a more politely stated way of saying "I don't believe that you are actually interested in a genuine answer to that question" and it is the most common meaning to "all right" when I use it. If you have asked me "How are you?" chances are that the more polite version is what I meant.
Thanks. I appreciate that. You know, it only occasionally bothers me to the extent that I start actually thinking about it. The way that sometimes you ask someone how they are and they completely ignore the question, assuming that you're using that throw-away greeting Jim mentions, I mean. I hate that, but I've gotten very used to it.
Wait a minute. I just re-read your comment and are more confused than ever. Which is the more polite version of the response you've used with me?
You'll see the source of my confusion:
"This is really a more politely stated way of saying... If you have asked me 'How are you?' chances are that the more polite version is what I meant."
Does this really mean you are dismissing me in such an oblique way that I might hardly notice it? I hate being dismissed.
Unless there are some cues to the contrary, I assume that people are using "How are you?" merely as a greeting---"Hello" with a bit of southern charm mixed in. That is my default mode. So, if you have asked me "How are you?" I probably assumed you were using the question as a greeting, rather than as a real question. If my response was, "all right" or "Okay," then that is exactly what I assumed.
However, there are some cues that will tell me that a person does not intend the question as a greeting. My favorite is:
"How are you?"
"All right."
"Okay, now tell me how you really are."
Other cues that people have used with me are interrupting the normal cadence of their speech, or very purposefully and pointedly establishing eye contact while asking the question. Some people reach out and touch me while asking the question. Only a few people can pull off that last one without wigging me out. Usually, that makes me very uncomfortable.
Very clear! Don't you just love getting to repeat yourself three or four times in a conversation?
Yes, believe it or not. It is frustrating at times to have to repeat and rephrase. But, I'd MUCH rather go through several rounds of "Are you saying x?" "No, I'm saying y?" Than to be misunderstood without it getting corrected.
Plus, it is extraordinarily affirming to me for someone to be interested enough in what I have to say to persist in asking until understanding is reached.
The problem, as Donald Rumsfeld observed, is not so much with the "known unknowns" as it with the "unknown unknowns." In other words, if a person knows that he doesn't understand something, he can seek clarification. When someone doesn't realize that he doesn't understand something, that's where most of the problems come in.
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