Mind Sprocket: The Back Page : How to Expand Your Vocabulary (and Know What Day It Is): The Desk Calendar

Something happened at the end of 2007 that left me feeling lost and unfocused. My off-the-wall Far Side calendar that I kept on my desk at work ended. It was a fantastic calendar (and if you keep up with the Far Side, you’ll know that this calendar was a special edition for 2007 and that one like it probably won’t be seen again for years, if ever, from Gary Larson). It had pages in color, it was full of dry humor, it was a reliable presence that saw me through nearly every day of the year. And on December 30, it was all over, and there was a void where there hadn’t been one before.

I had to think of something. I needed a calendar on my desk, one that would tell me exactly what day it was as soon as my eyes met it, one that wouldn’t give a whole week’s worth of days on one page and force my eyes to wander around it as I tried to remember what day of the week it was.

So I trekked over to Barnes & Noble on my lunch break in the second week of 2008 and surveyed the calendars that were well picked over, but now on sale. There were calendars with wistful one-liners (as if one line of inspiration could make my day at work seem any brighter), calendars of useless trivia (if it’s useless, why bother?), calendars of celebrity bloopers (I make enough of my own, really), etc.

None of these were fulfilling for me, a young, civilized, reasonably intelligent working girl. I sought knowledge and wit;, information that I could use to advance my career and future;, something with a subtle but distinct character that reflected what I wanted to be, what I could become.

Something like the lone American Heritage Dictionary 4th Edition page-a-day calendar, the last one in sight.

I smiled wistfully as I recalled afternoons in my high school English class, where we used the American Heritage Dictionary frequently, and where I first learned what “etymology” meant and was thus launched into a greater passion for the English language and its history. I didn’t hesitate. I purchased the dictionary calendar, thinking with a little bit of my typical skepticism that maybe I might manage to add one or two words to my vocabulary in 2008, and it couldn’t hurt to try it out.

Since January, I have learned several words on the subject of rocks (repicolous: thriving among or inhabiting rocks; and petrous: of, relating to, or resembling rock). I also learned the word that means “to build a nest” (nidify) which I will most likely never have a reason to use in my lifetime, but that I think is pretty neat. Interesting, yes, but useful? I still wasn’t convinced that I could reasonably expand my vocabulary this way.

But then one day (February 27th, to be exact) I tore off February 26th’s page to see the following one, and to my amusement, noticed a word that was new to me, but that described me perfectly. The word was ‘risible’, which means “capable of laughing or inclined to laugh.” Me, in the American Heritage Dictionary page-a-day calendar! My excessive and sometimes needless and spontaneous laughter has been commented upon many times by friends, but never before did I have such an accurate description of what it made me.

It took me until February 27th to feel as deep a connection with this new calendar as I did with my Far Side one – but now I know that I will be in good company at my desk, that I can pick up a few new words, that I will know what day it is, and that someone in my office truly understands me.