Shell Shocked: What’s in a word?
The editor of the Islander reached out to me the other day. She told me that I needed to have a colonoscopy.
I couldn’t believe she said that. “Is this a joke?” I asked. “Hasn’t April Fools Day already come and gone?”
“No,” she said. I’m serious. You need to look into getting a colonoscopy.”
How do you respond to such a comment that seemed to have come totally out of the blue?
“Why in the world are you suggesting this? Where did this come from? Have you been in touch with my primary care physician? Do you know something I don’t know?”
“No,” she responded. “I certainly haven’t been in touch with your physician. But it’s clear to the world that you’re abusing the colon. You’re not using it properly.”
I was really taken aback. I got very defensive. “I beg your pardon but how in the world would you have any idea how I use my colon?
My editor sounded as though she were talking to a grade school student. “Well, silly, I see samples of it every single week.”
I was stymied, floored, flummoxed and whatever other words I could think of that covered such a bizarre conversation.
“Are you pulling my leg,” I asked. “Is this your idea of a joke?”
“Absolutely not,” she said. “All of our readers are familiar with your colon. We all think you don’t have command of it. That’s why you should have a colonoscopy. You need to relearn how to use it.”
I tried a different approach. “Is this your way of saying that I’m not eating healthy enough? I try very hard to balance my meals and eat the right foods. I eat fruit, vegetables, chicken and fish. I try not to eat fried foods or drink too much. I may be a few pounds overweight but nothing serious.”
She cut me off. “This has absolutely nothing to do with what you eat. It’s just that your colon shows up in places it wasn’t meant to be in. You may need to consider a substitute for your colon.”
“A substitute for my colon? Are you suggesting I need surgery?”
“Metaphorically speaking, yes. You may need to cut things out.”
I had to take a break. Has my editor suddenly gone berserk? Was her job too much for her? Did she need counseling? I just had to get off the phone. I told her that my piano just arrived and that I had to tune it. I had known this editor for a long time and this was the craziest conversation I’d ever had with her. What was going on? What should I do? How could I help her? Then I came up with the idea that I would go along with her conversation flow and see where that led to.
I waited a few minutes and called her back. I played it nonchalant. “Well I just finished tuning my new piano and it now plays like an accordion. Ha, he.”
She didn’t laugh. I said “Let’s talk this colon thing through. Why do you really think I need help with it?”
She said: “Because you use it everywhere. You use it where semicolons should go. Or dashes, or simply conjunctives. Your columns often look like a gun target after someone fired bullets at.”
Now I understood. She was talking about the colon used in grammar not the one that makes up the large intestine.
I said: “I completely misunderstood you. I thought you were referring to the colon in my intestinal track. But why would you use the term colonoscopy when referring to the use of a colon in a sentence?”
She said: “What else should I call it — a pronounoscopy?”