stopping by words on a sunny morning

Several times a day I heft my English Dictionary off the bookshelf beside my computer to consult it about a word.

I love the whisper of the pages, and the feel of paper that’s so thin it’s almost translucent.

Every time I do this I usually stumble across a word or two that sticks in my mind.

Today it was detumescence: “the subsidence of a swelling, esp. the return of a swollen organ, such as the penis, to the flaccid state.” A fancy Latin term for what can be a pleasant state – the golden basking immediately after sex – or the result of a horrible realisation: the door slamming heralds the early return of your lover’s husband.

Then I happened across englut: “1 to devour ravenously; swallow eagerly. 2 to glut or sate (oneself); surfeit; satiate.”

Those descriptions evoke images of an orgy of self-indulgence. Like when you assemble around yourself a feast of delicacies, your favourite beverage, and turn on that movie you’ve been anticipating all day.

Hmmm, hungry now.