On Language

We all (for the most part) know how we feel. It's an intrinsic, instinctual sense. Beyond second-nature, our feelings simply are, and in that way they are definitive aspects of who we are as people.

But there's a wide gap between knowing how we feel and expressing how we feel. Far too often, we fail to adequately or accurately express our feelings, and it's that discrepancy that causes problems, big and small. It's why we laugh at something that isn't funny or snap at someone who doesn't deserve it. Those situations are the manifestations of our failed attempts to do something incredibly basic -- let others know how we feel. It's not always so dramatic. A lot of times it's something as simple as being unable to recount a dream to a friend. We can go on and on about the colors we remember and the vague shapes of people we think were also there, but we can never capture that rush of happiness or exhilaration last night's dream left us with.

Because language is where we try to solve this dilemma of self expression. It's one of our best means to make others understand us, but it's rarely as easy as it sounds. That's why so many of our stories end with "I guess you just had to be there." We try, but can't manage to give an appropriate rendition of what's going on inside our heads.

Language is the key to that expression, but it's also a tool many are good at but few have ever mastered. Still, while self-articulation is deceptively difficult, it's in the pursuit of it that I find a great deal of joy. Which is why I can't explain (appropriately enough) the utter euphoria I experience whenever I catch myself mid-sentence, struggling to find the right word that's hanging on the tip of my tongue, floundering in my pursuit of clarity, until out of the muddled haze of forgotten SAT flash cards emerges the perfect word, blessing me with the ability to do one thing, simply and purely -- and that's finish my fucking sentence.

Bliss.

It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's one of those victories nobody can take away from you.

So what's the lesson? Maybe it's that while language is one of those basic things so many take for granted, it's also our most vital path toward self-expression. It may confound us with its temperament, but it's worth perfecting as best we can. Today I toast language, for its frustrations, for its power, and for its promise.