Months back in this space I mentioned some of the extremely specific topics I’ve covered since this column began in 2003.

Would you believe one of the columns analyzed the word “up,” and how it can be used in many contexts, as in finish up, grow up, wise up, etc., without necessarily having anything to do with direction.

Another column discussed the way people end their sentences with “so …,” and, you know, another like parsed the overuse of “like” and “ya know.”

How about a fresh topic? This will explain the way we use “fresh” and discuss how that word is used, depending on our sex and age.

Let me explain:

As a pre-teen, in a house with three older sisters, I heard the word “fresh” applied not to vitamins, vegetables or viewpoints, but (mostly) to adolescent men. Before I grew accustomed to “fresh” as a way of describing the newness and unsullied quality of things, I heard of men, usually those destined never to have a second date, regarded as fresh. Continue reading →

A long-held belief — whether it’s based on myth, practice or even superstition — says that whatever doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.

Taking that analogy a step farther, we can then assume that a broken bone actually heals and becomes tougher, or a person who survives a particular illness soon become impervious to that ailment, a kind of immunity.

It was later in life that I heard many versions of the “makes us stronger” mantra, usually on the football field or at some athletic event.

I wonder, then, whether some of the body’s senses act the same way. Specifically, when I began smoking, around my junior year in high school, I started noticing that my sense of smell weakened. The piquant aroma of the really hot chile Mom used to make somehow didn’t hit me in the same way.

Before that, coming for supper each evening after delivering papers, I could usually recite Mom’s entire menu for that meal. Continue reading →

Time changes things. Or at least, the lack of time changes things by rendering them trite, banal.

Ever notice when someone utters something while taking off from a red light, or on the way out the door? In my case, in the rush,  I sometimes fail to understand and respond with something all-purpose, like “You’ve got it” or “That’s correct” or “I see what you mean” or “Yes, I agree” or “Good point.”

We can sometimes get away with these pat, unrehearsed replies, but what if the person who addressed us said, “I’m a little short. Can you lend me a hundred till payday?” What if the person were to have uttered, “All your former students call you ‘Blackboard Breath’”? Would one of the pedestrian, clichéd answers come to mind when nothing profound will surface for a question like “May I borrow your car?” Continue reading →

A comic strip I remember from my childhood showed Dagwood helping Blondie with the Thanksgiving dishes. He broke one, causing Blondie to say, “If you break one more plate, I won’t let you help me with the dishes anymore.” And a light bulb went on in Dagwood’s speech balloon.

Would a Spanish version of the same comic strip have used a slightly different word with a slightly different meaning?

Let me explain:

The other day, a friend said she was preparing to wash the Thanksgiving dishes. But she said it in Spanish, and the word for “wash” came out as “fregar.” I was expecting her to use the verb “lavar” for “wash.” Now anyone who grew up in northern New Mexico ought to know that in our parlance, “fregar” doesn’t refer to washing the dishes at all. “Fregar” means to bother, molest, pester, annoy. Continue reading →

The first time many of us saw Rudolfo Anaya was when he spoke to Highlands students and staff in a packed Sala de Madrid, around 1972.

He had just completed his first — and in my opinion, his best — novel, “Bless Me, Ultima,” now a movie that my family and I saw at a multi-screen theater in Santa Fe last weekend.

Back in the early ‘70s, I was assigned a couple of composition classes that allowed me to teach six sections of a class called Exposition II. I chose Anaya’s new novel as the main component of the course and I get the impression the classes loved it.

Whether it’s a compliment or an indicator of limited post-Highlands reading, a few students have since told me, 40 years later, that Anaya’s book had stuck with them and remains among their favorites. Continue reading →

I want to shout out — to total strangers if necessary — “Hey, the election’s over.” Of course, I’m viewing this political theater through the eyes of someone who’s pleased with the results.

Obama got re-elected, gaining about 125 more electoral votes than his opponent, Mitt Romney. Yet, bloggers, those who spend half their lives writing comments online, usually on Facebook, continue the assault.

Let me explain:

I believe few will disagree that this was by far the foulest, most mud-slinging election in memory, perhaps in history. Imagine grownups throwing big bucks into campaigns while enriching the media, mostly TV stations, to damn the opposition. Continue reading →

As part of a let’s-be-friendly gesture, I once asked my then-next-door neighbor, James, if he’d help me unload some lumber from my pickup.

I’d bought several pieces of wood to shore up our fence, and as I noticed him sipping Sun Tea on his porch, I sweetened the offer:

“And if you help me, I’ll give you a whole dollar.”

“A whole dollar?” James asked. “How about if I give you a whole dollar to leave me alone?” That’s how neighbors in Camp Luna get along. By the way, he did help me unload — a three-minute job — but refused my magnanimous whole dollar offer. Continue reading →

On a particularly scary Halloween night, I darkened our living room and turned on a radio to prepare to be scared out of my wits. Of course, my two older sons, 7 and 10 at the time, were part of the mix, as was the then-1-year-old, Ben, even if he couldn’t yet follow the plot.

Let me explain:

A Highlands University journalism student, Joseph Von Rodeck, came up with a frightful radio script to a play that I thought would go over quite well with the Las Vegas audience. He invited me to be the narrator and selected other classmates and acquaintances to fill in the various roles.

The original plan was to present the hour-long program live, but some question about logistics at KFUN-KLVF changed that: something about the size of the studio. So we put it on tape. Continue reading →

Oh, pardon me, sir, ma’am, but did I invade your privacy? Excuuuuse me for peeking into your mail, most of which even you haven’t read, since much of the correspondence, which goes back to the year 2004, is still in sealed envelopes. And lots of the items are the same. Those things happen when people keep dunning you.

Let me explain:

Saturday morning, as my son, Diego, and my wife, Bonnie, went for their daily constitutional, behind Camp Luna, past the rifle range, toward a place we call Los Abeytas, they came across something you must have dropped. If it had been a wallet or a driver’s license or anything else of value that could be identified, we would have made a special trip to return it.

What you left was pounds and piles of trash strewn about. We didn’t find much of real value. We now know your name, address and phone number, and in sifting through some of the stuff, we’ve been able to create a mini-profile of the family. Continue reading →

“When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

The book of Corinthians omitted one thing: What about eating? I didn’t eat as a child does. I liked the spicy stuff.

So there I was, entering Estella’s Cafe on Bridge Street, by myself, at around age 11. For a long time, I failed to remember why I was there, alone. I recall now that I’d gone to the Kiva Theater with my parents, failed to get the movie plot, and wandered off, across the street to check out their burgers. Continue reading →