Labour Day

Making language work for workers

by

Howard Richler

September 2^nd marks Labour Day and if your labour is solely laborious, take solace that this was the original connotation of the word. When the word first surfaces in English in the 14^th century, its only sense was as “arduous toil” and by the late 16^th century the word was used to refer to the rigours of childbirth. It was only in 1776 that it that its main sense today of work done in order to obtain material wants and needs surfaced in Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations: “The annual labour of every nation is the fund which originally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniencies of life, which it annually consumes.”

More than a century after the first Labour Day observance, there remains some doubt as to who first proposed the holiday for workers. Some records indicate that Peter J. McGuire, general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a co-founder of the American Federation of Labor, was first in suggesting a day to honour those “who from rude nature have delved and carved all the grandeur we behold." Many people however, credit a machinist named Matthew Maguire as the holiday’s founder.

In any case, the first Labour Day holiday was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882, in New York City, In 1884, the first Monday in September was selected as the holiday, and the Central Labor Union urged similar organizations in other cities to follow the example of New York and celebrate a “workingmen's holiday" on that date. The idea spread with the growth of labor organizations, and in 1885 Labor Day was celebrated in many American industrial centers.

In Canada, on April 15, 1872, the Toronto Trades Assembly organized the first North American “workingman's demonstration.” Some 10,000 Torontonians turned out to watch a parade and to listen to speeches calling for abolition of the law which decreed that “trade unions were criminal conspiracies in restraint of trade.” On July 23, 1894, the Canadian Government enacted legislation making Labour Day, the first Monday of September of each year into a national holiday.

The labour movement appropriated some common English words and gave them specific work-related senses. The use of “strike” to mean “withdraw labour, ” developed in the mid 18^th century and is first recorded in The Annual Register in 1768: “A body of sailors...proceeded...to Sunderland.., and at the cross there read a paper, setting forth their grievances... After this they went on board the several ships in that harbour, and struck (lowered down) their yards, in order to prevent them from proceeding to sea.”

The word “scab” is first noted in the 13^th century and referred to a “disease of the skin” and the OED relates that by the end of the 16^th century it acquired a slang sense as a term of abuse or depreciation applied to persons: “A mean, low, ‘scurvy’ fellow; a rascal, scoundrel, occasionally applied to a woman. ” By the end of the 18^th century this negative sense was extended to refer to a person who refuses to join a strike or who takes over the work of a striker.

“Picket” also has been extended in meaning. and comes from the military sense of a small detached body of troops, sent out to watch for the approach of the enemy or its scouts . Ultimately, the word comes from the French piquet which referred to a wooden stake driven into the ground.

To paraphase Paul Simon, “There must be fifty ways to lose your job such as “rightsize,” “deselect,” “rif” (short for reduction in force) and being a victim of “involuntary attrition.” If you bemoan these 21^th century euphemisms for job dismisssal, you can take small comfort that the euphemistic process started even earlier. In Dickens’ Pickwick Papers a character states “I wonder what old Fogg ‘ud say if he knew it, I should get the sack, I s’pose- eh? ”  This expression goes back to the days when workmen had to provide their own tools that were kept in a bag at the employer’s workshop. When you were given back your sack it meant you were dismissed. Even the seemingly non-euphemistic “fire” came into American English in the late 19^th century as a punning alternate to “discharge.” 

Enjoy a non-laborious Labour Day

hrichler@gmail.com

Howard's latest book is How Happy Became Homosexual and other mysterious semantic shifts.

Words from law

(This article appeared in the Sept Lexpert and is an excerpt from my book How Happy Became Homosexual and other mysterious semantic shifts.)

Law terms have transcended the legal arena

by

Howard Richler

Some laypeople find the specialized vocabulary of law inaccessible, yet it has bequeathed everyday words to the hoi polloi. While one might not be surprised that a term such as entrust originated in the field of law where it means to “invest with a trust,” other terms that have transcended their legal confines are not so apparent. For example, the first OED definition of “devise” is “the act of devising, apportioning, or assigning, by will; a testamentary disposition of real property; the clause in a will conveying this.” The OED adds this quote from Sir F. Pollock's Land Laws (1887): “A gift by will of freehold land, or of such rights arising out of or connected with land as are by English law classed with it as real property, is called a devise. A gift by will of personal property is called a bequest.” The verb sense of devise meaning to contrive derived from its sense as a verb “to assign or give by will.”

There are many other words that escaped the legal matrix. Here are a few:

Abeyance

The first OED definition stemming from the 16^th century is “Expectation or contemplation of law; the position of waiting for or being without a claimant or owner.” In the subsequent century it acquired a general sense of a state of temporary or permanent disuse.

Pupil

We see this word used in the 14^th century in the legal community to refer to an orphan who is a minor and therefore a ward of the state. The first citation of such is found in John Wycliffe's 1382 translation of the Bible where James 1:27 mentions this Christian duty: “To visite pupilles, that is, fadirles or modirles, or bothe, and widewes in her tribulacioun.” The current sense of a student being taught by a teacher developed in the 16^th century.

Curfew

If you establish a curfew for a teenager, you may be doing so to protect the young hellion from metaphorical burns. A curfew, however, was established originally not to avoid metaphorical fires but actual ones. In medieval Europe, many communities enacted a regulation whereby a bell was rung at a fixed hour in the evening signalling that street fires be extinguished, sometimes by covering the fire. This applied also to lights and was termed couvre feu, French for “cover fire.” This morphed almost immediately in English to “curfew,” and by the 13^th century “curfew” merely designated the time the evening bell was rung. There were a myriad of spellings for the word including “curpheue,” and “corfu.” Only in the 20^th century was the sense of curfew extended to refer to other restricted outdoor nocturnal activities. Punch magazine in 1939 stated, “The attempt..to get a nine o'clock curfew imposed on members of the Women's Land Army in training..to prevent them going out with soldiers.” How ironic that a French word should dampen passion!

Elide

This originated as a term in law to destroy or annihilate the force of evidence, and to quash, annul, and rebut. This sense was generalized in the 19^th century to mean to pass over in silence or strike out. The word's most common sense nowadays is grammatical, i.e., to omit a vowel or syllable in pronunciations (e.g., pronouncing family, fam-lee) and this sense dates back to the late 18^th century.

Entail

In the 14th century, “entail” meant to settle an estate into a “fee tail” (feudum talliatum in Latin) so that it passed on to the owner’s heirs, lest the possessor wanted to bequeath it to someone else. In the 16th century the sense was extended to include bestowing an estate and to something being attached. This was the meaning John Bunyan had in mind in The Holy City (circa 1665) when he writes, “His name was always so entailed to that doctrine.” It wasn't until the 19^th century that it acquired its most common sense nowadays of involving or resulting in something inevitably.

Banal

This word originated as a legal term that meant belonging to compulsory feudal service, and derived from the 13^th century word “ban,” meaning authoritative proclamation. Obviously, compulsory feudal service wasn't held in high regard because before long it acquired its modern senses of trite, commonplace and trivial.

Demise

This word was borrowed from the field of law. Its first definition from the early 16^th in the OED is “Conveyance or transfer of an estate by will or lease.” The key to the change of meaning is the word “transfer.” Later in the century the transfer in question became the devolution of sovereignty that occurred with the death of a king. Hence by the 18^th century demise became just another of the many euphemisms for “death.” Since the 20^th century the word is often used to connote a failure of a business.

In the next issue, we will look yet more words that moved from a legal sphere to a general domain. This article is adapted from Howard Richler's recently released How Happy Became Homosexual and other mysterious semantic shifts published by Ronsdale Press. It is available both as a print and as an ebook.

facebook puzzles-351-450

351-What do these words & terms have in common? : occupy-plutoed-app-y2k-wmd

352-Discern the convergent words: melon-break-soda    ice-cellar-white     
feed-supreme-lemon

353-What do these words have in common? oral—paper-sentient

354-Discern the convergent words: dud-chicken-tea    cancer-cell-high
rock-claw-red

355-Name a nine letter word with only one vowel?

356-Discern the convergent words: joke-nap-comeback              sky-spree-meadow sea-gang-medal

357-What do these words have in common? jerky-quinoa-puma

358-Discern the convergent words : Spanish-mushroom-western    bean-cake-table salad-basket-grape

359-What do these words have in common? wound-defect-console

360-Discern the convergent words : bone-milk-stroke    dry-collar-back             singing-sore-cut

361-What do these words have in common? loot-jungle thug

362- Discern the convergent words: copy-great-can     tears-rock-skin                   boast-Indian-scare

363-What do these words have in common? useless-eroding-pampered

364- Discern the convergent words: horn-sitting -pit                  honey-harass-state story-flat-shell

365-What do these words have in common? plaza-barracuda-canyon

366- Discern the convergent words: grease-nudge-guard                pay-pedal-play beach-tree-ate

367-Name 2 words that are anagrams& antonyms

368- Discern the convergent words: amen-guard-music                      in-app-ring attack-open-felt

369-What do these words have in common? congenial-hideous-immoral

370- Discern the convergent words: boy-black-fishing                    desert-trot -out black-dive-song

371-What do these words have in common? appeasement,arpeggio,bedchamber, fortunately

372- Discern the convergent words:shoe-be-tree                              cake-tree-drop plum-bread-blood

373- Name a country that is an anagram to a world capital.

374- Discern the convergent words:dirty-fink-catcher           computer-earth-heart collar-feathers-hobby

375-What do these words have in common? compete-daring-pubic

376- Discern the convergent words: ball-dis-place                             flint-deep-red ache-endure-acid

377-Name a city whose last five letters are an anagram to its first fivee letters.

378- Discern the convergent words: loaf-head-core                      water-winter-ball maid-teeth-breast

379-Name a US city of 100,000 where both city & state comprised of 1 pointers in Scrabble.

380- Discern the convergent words: fall-fire-flood               sailor-smelling-table brown-corn-crumbs

381-What do these words have in common? adjudicant-microbeer-briefly

382- Discern the convergent words: ash-short-marble                   cane-sugar-store pool-chicken -spot

383-What do these words have in common? islander-Islam-Gentile

384- Discern the convergent words: pot-up-pork                          hind-lame-less disease-stone-donor

385-What do these words have in common? bran-bone-taco-recipe

386-got-up-bucking       orange-roasted-lame      famine-hot-salad

387-Name an American city that is an angram to verb that might apply to a doctor.

388- Discern the convergent words: kick-laid-nickel                      polish-gun-toe fondle-tie-lace

389-Name a 4 letter city in Italy that is an anagram to word that is a homophone for a family designation.

390- Discern the convergent words: ping-queen-honey                   early-brain-black up-dips-off

391-What do these words have in common? avid-flaming-roster

392- Discern the convergent words: car-sore-stiff                        hang-art-finger sausage-shed-shot

393-Name a country that is an anagram to a dance

394- Discern the convergent words: lack-spray-red                       hole-counter-crust hut-parlor-dough

395-Name a US placenames of at least 10 letters where the only vowel is an i.

396- Discern the convergent words: colony-defend-hem         bill-plains-wings cigarette-hair-dung

397-What do these words have in common? gung-ho-ketchup

398- Discern the convergent words: master-scout-by                              ate-tail-con rein-skin-red

399-What do these words have in common? cider-cabal-behemoth

400- Discern the convergent words: cheese-stray-nanny                    sly-egg-Canada lip-brain-times

401-What do these words have in common? moth-paper-prism

402- Discern the convergent words: call-food-bob        spring-yellow-fingers practitioner-only-owner

403-What do these words have in common? presto-duet-trombone

404- Discern the convergent words: smart-fat-donkey                 claw-rock-spiny flying-grey-night

405-Name a Middle East city that is an anagram to a resident of a certain MiddleEast country.

406- Discern the convergent words: safe-animal-fire                    face-thrash-soda favor-paste-powder

407- What do these words have in common? sallow-eighty-layer

408- Discern the convergent words: ale-bay-black                     raisin-ding-muffin apple-raspberry-peach

409-What do these words have in common? shibboleth-leviathan-cider

410- Discern the convergent words: led-shot-skin                         ick-crossing-lodge sea-shoe-whip

411-Aside from starting with a K what do these surnames have in common: Kovacs, Kowalski, Kuznetsov.

412- Discern the convergent words: coat-high-band               harness-soft-blade reading-stick-fat

413-Aside from starting with an S what do these surnames have in common?: Seaver-Stalin-Stabler- Streep.

414- Discern the convergent words: water-wet-woods                barrel-dance-lead hawk-level-lid

415-What do these words have in common? caucus-pone-squash

416- Discern the convergent words: stock-sword- white              first-passion-cake cake-burger-goat

417-What do these words have in common? reward-diaper-straw

418- Discern the convergent words: boat-spiny-electric              white-good-whisk dark-bar-chip

419-What do these words have in common? treat-brand-inventor

420- Discern the convergent words: paper-shark-woods      golden-bumps -grey sandwich-salad melt-

421-Name a European city of at lesat 8 letters where all letters are 1 point in Scrabble

422- Discern the convergent words: kid-tease-steak                        strap-cold-pad paper-connective-face

423-Name a word of at least 9 letters where every letter is “odd.” e.g a=1 c=3

424- Discern the convergent words: draw-drop-full                         sore-stiff-pony deep-clearing-cut

425-What do these words and phrases have in common? Gone with the wind-scapegoat- sour grapes

426- Discern the convergent words: brain-snow-soup                  farmer-oil-salted cutter-monster-jar

427-What do these words have in common? service-prison-curfew

428- Discern the convergent words: true-type-work               structure-whale-wish strain-wall-wear

429-What do these words have in common? vanilla-exuberant-hysterical

430- Discern the convergent words: water-winter-ball                 maid-teeth-breast stud-raga-bran

431-Name a country whose currency can be obtained by changing a letter in the country and scrambling the new word.

432-Discern the convergent words: beef-moose-cheese              up-chicken-peanut crab-juice-computer

433-What do these words have in common? perpetuity-proprietor-repertoire

434-Discern the convergent words: steak-doctor-black                   barrel-belly-root blue-straw-chuck

435-What do these words have in common? costumier-endears-semolina

436-Discern the convergent words: dollar-pearl-led                       ball-eaten-gypsy grey-mighty-pad

437-What do these words have in common? hominal-streamingly-grainery

438-Discern the convergent words: recognition-save-whit     butter-ring-nail-
drain- food-fart

439-What do these words have in common? pumpernickel-feisty-fizzle

440-Discern the convergent words: run-sea-star                           turtle-plunged-tail hum-shutter-super

441-What do these words have in common? ours-pain-pays-chat-fort

442-Discern the convergent words: holy-boy-girl    king-complain-salad                    tag-watch-leg

443-Name a city in Italy that is an anagram to a city in France.

444-Discern the convergent words: cotton-be-rummy   berry-wild-mother                bag-ball-head

445-What do these words have in common? slogan, tor, Tory

446-Discern the convergent words: king-gang-mountain    cocktail-roll-red          black-ranch-dog

447-What state has 2 prof sports teams whose nicknames are colors.

448-Discern the convergent words: hold-pigeon-big                        beat-low-sing space-spin-stage

449-What do these words have in common?

450-Discern the convergent words: ham-head-herring                     barrel-nut-deep dive-job-spray

(This articled first appeared in the June 2013 The Senior Times with the title Pronoun envy and the singularization of they.)

        The singularization of they

                   by

          Howard Richler

Although the English language offers its speaker a large vocabulary, it is missing some useful words particularly in the realm of referencing other people. For example, many people are not comfortable with referencing their in-laws as Mom and Dad, yet are not comfortable with calling them by their first names. Some term of endearment more accurate than Mom or Dad would fill this void.

The English language also lacks a name for unmarried persons who share a

domestic and romantic relationship. Terms like “boyfriend” and “girlfriend” sound adolescent, “lover” is too blatant, “lady friend” and “gentlemen” are euphemistic and “significant other” is meaningless. Ironically, Quebecois French has solved this problem by importing the English word “chum” to fulfill this vocabulary need. Many other words are used in English to refer to this relationship, such as “partner,” “companion,” and “cohabitor” but all of them are either euphemistic-sounding or inaccurate.

Seeing that Quebecois French has solved this problem by usurping the English word “chum,” I suggest we exact retribution by appropriating a French word. My suggestion is the word “co-vivant.” English already uses the French term “bon vivant” to refer to someone who enjoys the “good life,” and putting the prefix “co” in front of “vivant” highlights the idea that one’s pleasures should be shared – the essence of a relationship.

English also lacks a neutral third person singular pronoun. Thus in the sentence “If anyone wants a cheeseburger ___ can have one,” we have a choice of using either the words “he” or “she” in which case we may be making an incorrect statement as to gender; or we can use the word “they” in which case “they” is seemingly not in agreement with its singular antecedent “anyone.” Saying “he or she” solves this problem but its usage is somewhat cumbersome.

Contrary to popular opinion, the generic “he” is not a long-established usage in the English language. It was not until the 18^th century that this rule appeared in English grammar books and it was not until the 19^th century that the rule became entrenched. In fact, in 1850 an Act of Parliament in England gave official sanction to this recently established concept of the generic “he.” Parliament ordained that “words importing the masculine gender shall be deemed and taken to include females.”

As language is primarily a tool to communicate, the generic “he” is clearly faulty because it provides false or misleading information about the sex of the referents. For example, if one says “Everyone on the choir raised his voice in song,” one is giving the impression that it is an all male ensemble.

Many languages avoid sex designation in pronouns by having a word such as the Turkish o which can refer to “he or “she.” Similarly in Finnish hän can refer to a man or a woman. In English, over eighty words have been suggested to cover this situation such as “te,” “ter,” “tem,” “hesh,” “co,” “shem,” and “thon,” but none of them has acquired much currency. In fact, when Webster's International Dictionary , Second Edition was published in 1934 the word “thon” was listed but when the Third Edition was released in 1962 this entry was not included because hardly anyone had used this new pronoun in the interim. Languages are resistant to accepting new words that are central to their grammar.

What to do? For me, the issue is clear. Pronoun envy aside, the intent of language is to communicate, and by using “he” or “his” we may be imparting incorrect or misleading information about the sex of the participants. John McWhorter, in The Word on the Street, says that “they” is “singular as well as plural for the simple reason that the language has changed and made it so. The idea that ‘they’ is only a plural pronoun is an illusion based on treating the English of one thousand years ago as if it was somehow hallowed, rather than just one arbitrary stage of an endless evolution over time.” After all, centuries ago a distinction was made between “thou and “you,” with the former referring to a second person singular pronoun and the latter to a second person plural pronoun, but by the 17^th century “thou” fell into disuse in standard English.

I don’t expect everyone is going to agree with me on this issue. To each their own.

Howard's book How Happy Became Homosexual and other mysterious semantic shifts was published in May 2013.

hrichler@gmail.com

Why the names of some animals fell from grace

(This article first appeared in the June Lexpert under the title "Rhymes With Lass."   

 

Why the names of some animals fell from grace

by

Howard Richler

This past January I listened to a podcast at lexiconvalley@slate.com that discussed the proclivity of New Yorkers to drop their Rs in speech. This phenomenon is known to linguists as non-rhoticity and is common to several English accents in North America and abroad.

It is hard to think of a more quintessential New Yorker than Woody Allen, and probably as a result podcast host Mike Vuolo by way of example of this speech pattern played this line by Woody Allen's neurotic character Mickey in the movie Hannah and Her Sisters: “Oh God, there's a tumor in my head the size of a basketball.” Of course, when Woody's character delivers the line, the italicized growth is rendered R-less as too-muh.

As traumatic as this event may have been to the hypochondriac character, all we see with this non-rhoticity is a change in pronunciation. There is however, an example where this process led to a whole new word.

Nowadays the word “arse” is seem by some to be a euphemism for “ass” but in fact the former word for the posterior precedes the latter being first recorded in the year 1000 whereas the latter use is not found until the 19^th century. Of course, the word “ass” to refer (as the OED phrases it) as a “quadruped of the horse kind” also is found as far back as the 11^th century, and herein lay a problem.

For as non-rhoticity became prevalent in the 18^th century, it just would not do for any wholesome “lass” to rhyme with the newly pronounced “arse,” as “ass,” and it became proper to avoid using this term around 1760. Hugh Rawson relates in his Dictionary of Euphemism and other Doubletalk that “pre-Victorians became nervous about calling the barnyard critter, the ass by its rightful name, because the three-letter word sounded like the bad four-letter one when the “r” was dropped.” Enter donkey.

But donkey did not emerge as the definitive ass substitute immediately. For about 50 years the word “neddy” was used as frequently as donkey. By 1830 donkey was ensconced as the heir apparent. The usual etymological explanation of donkey is that it descends from the word “dun,” meaning brownish grey, and that the “k” in donkey was added to make it rhyme with monkey, which it did originally.

The donkey was not the only animal that was created due to language sensitivity. According to the OED, a rabbit originally referred to the young long-eared mammal of the “Oryctolagus cuniculus, order Lagomorpha” whereas the adults were called “cony” “coney”or “cunny” and the word was pronounced to rhyme with “honey.” Herein lies the root of why the word became improper. Cony was used as a term of endearment for a woman by the 16^th century and a reference to her genitalia by the next century.

Thus the word “cony,” which referred to the adult of the species was deemed to have too much of an “adult” sense and it was replaced in the 19th century by the word “rabbit.” There still remained the problem of what to do when reading the Bible, where cony was firmly entrenched. In 1836 Benjamin H. Smart found a solution. The OED tells us that for “solemn reading” Smart ordained that what previously rhymed with “honey” would henceforth rhyme with “bony.”

Needless to say, the word cock to refer to the male fowl has been unceremoniously ousted by rooster. Even more insulting, however, is the fact that many words featuring cock have been bowdlerized. Apricots were once apricocks or apricox, haystacks were originally haycocks, and weather vanes were once weathercocks. Even people’s names were subject to the expunging of cocks. Nineteenth century author Louisa May Alcott was so named because her father had changed the family name from Alcox. Canadian author T.C. Haliburton was probably having sport, however, in his 1844 novel Sam Slick, when he has a young man tell a young woman that her brother had become not a “coxswain” in the navy, but a “rooster-swain.”

Unfortunately the proud cock developed figurative associations. Shakespeare had more in mind than the bearing of arms in Henry V when Pistol yells at Nym: “Pistol’s cock is up.” When cock’s allusions became widely enough known among puerile males, the term became indecent and unspeakable in polite company. Open the barn door for rooster.

The first citation of rooster in the OED is an American reference from 1772. The word was still unusual enough in England 50 years later that James Flint in his 1822 Letters from America had to explain to British readers that “rooster, or he-bird, is the male of the hen.”

So in place of the evocative onomatopoeic word cock, we have the mediocre word rooster, (i.e., he who roosts) as the definitive word for this animal. And unlike Jesus, who may have been denied three times by Peter, we are denied three proud Biblical words: ass, cony, and cock.

Howard's book How Happy Became Homosexual and Other Mysterious Semantic Shifts was published in May 2013 by Ronsdale Press of Vancouver.

Convergent Word Puzzles- 301-350

Answers to be supplied upon request.

Find The Convergent Word

Finfd the convergent words for each set of three words. Each set of three words fits into one of three categories: food & beverage, body parts, animals

301- a)tale-star-hook b)irate-halt-ire c)annoy-bear-love

302- a)computer-golden-sauce b)mix-walk-crust stain-wings-dry

303- a)figure-pin-line b)tie-acid-language c)sock-let-black

304- a)hop-cool-bone b)coerce-mass-stomach c)punch-artificial-shaped

305- a)nation-reich-party b)weight-paper-butter c)ilk-book-wood

306- a)blond-fields-pink b)vulture-wild-tom c)house-fin-pale

307- a)acid-import-fire b)church-computer-trap c)harass-dog-grey

308- a)boat-train-bonus b)ice-log-pearl c)roll-goose-hunt

309- a)king-complain-salad b)fool-egg-soup c)rubber-fingers-yellow

310- a)lone-prairie-she b) baby-con -in c)grease-business-bars

311- a)tack-tom-hole b)cancer-high-pool c)high-eye-beat

312- a)bell-pot-sergeant b)pie-face-oven c)house-case -job

313- a)tomato-kitchen-spoon b)apple-pan-bowl c)soup-evade-dead

314- a)hare-dead -teaser b)oil-deer -tight c)out-eye-backs

315- a)lock-bone-breaker b)block-master-lead c)dog-ion-boot

316 a)fed-pop-meal b) money-draft -small c)tale-star-hook

317- a)fault-stool-powder b)around hook-blue c)ball-big-hired -

318- a) follow-tired-bird b) hole-backwards-ail c)state-harass-honey

319- a)superb-night-barn b)ears-white-bush c)all-sea-hunting

320- a)basket-ginger-money b)bar-potato-days c)he-master-ski

321- a)boy-sour-nut b)mar-twist-cotton c)dog-monk-devil

322- a)close-elephant-ant b)naked-ram-eye c)gall -pleas-ten

323- a)ache-wind-knuckle b)dog-ache-nest c)leaders-check-pie

324- a)some-assistance-farm b)open-book-lift c)support-stern-diamond

325- a)dear-badger-comb b)green-nut-chick c)butter-stand-salted

326- a)cash-sacred-hide) b)hit-man-cricket c)bug-arms-tolerate

327- a)middle-identify-paint b)war-barrel-nut c)up-a-strap

328- a)string-let-sandwich b)thwart-ale-hop c)scampi-cocktail-boat

329- a)reap-alligator-led b)jelly-old-soup c)complaint-roast-eater

330- a)lash-breaking-fall b)shoe-be-bubble c)body-net-ball

331- a)circus-market-bag b)lily-woods-white c)cat-uncle-boy

332- a)republic-top-boat b)breast-soup-butter c)bill-plains-wings

333- a)tip-hold-clip b)wash-organ-off c)pump-close-fight

334- a)back-god-skin b)spare-steak-cage c)bone-deep-joint

335- a)sitting-soup-avoid b)eye-bald-American c)skin-basket-boat

336- a)rice-black-potato b)hole-ears-jack c)black-beret-bush

337- a)Indian-pudding-paddy b)bowl-fruit-green c)farm-fry-pink

338- a)button-beer-ache b)blue-give-artificial) c)milk-back-dry

339- a)throb-less -sweet b)top-swing-talk c)mark-shot-wig

340- a)juice-root-top b)cream-blue-cloth c)pie-wood-orchard

341- a)meat-loan-tiger b)hole-ears-jack c)opera-high-radish

342- a)lucky-collar-devil b)dog-rush-fighter c)sea-poke- pox

343- a)aired-imp-wife b)brown-cane-daddy c)hero-islands-tuna

344- a)slat-in-as b)pant-page-shackle c)berry-wild-mother

345- a)laid-lash-light b)jerk-pad-cap c)under-sandwich-white

346- a)cheese-Spanish-mushroom b)bar-bay-pearl c)garden-oil-black

347- a)vulture-wild-tom b)dove-neck-snapping c)white-killer-hunt

348- a)party-cozy-set) b)master-French-salute c)soup-sauce-juice

349- a)heat-peck-party b)wart-road-groun c)hide-crazy-power

350- a)part-rod-battering b)farm-fry-pink c)dog-pig-white

MOTHER"S DAY ARTICLES BY JEREMY &JENNIFER RICHLER

Mothers' Day bouquets in Mexico City Photo by YURI CORTEZ/AFP/GettyImages

For years, I hated Mother's Day. My mother died when I was 22, and every year after that, when spring rolled around and the greeting cards reared their heads, I felt the resentment start to bubble up. “Tell mom how much she really means,” the signs at Hallmark implored me. It felt like a mean joke, just another reminder of all I’d lost.

My mother and I had always been close, but in the last few years before she died, after I’d gone off to college, we’d gotten closer. We emailed a few times a day, relating the little details of our lives. I knew what she’d had for lunch, how her best friend’s daughter was settling into her new apartment. She knew which book I was reading for my Russian novel class, which of my roommates was pissing me off. We had catchphrases, inside jokes we’d repeat in the emails and cards we sent each other.

The first Mother's Day after she died, passing by some greeting cards in a store, I thought about buying her one. Maybe, I thought, I could start a ritual of getting her a card every year—a kind of “taking back” of the holiday. But then I thought about how I’d never actually send the cards, how they’d just sit in a drawer somewhere, the way the flowers I brought to her grave every year just lay there, wilting, until someone threw them out. And the inside jokes would never change—my mother and I were frozen in time, like the picture of us on my nightstand, taken just a couple of months before she died. I decided not to get her any cards. And I continued to hate Mother's Day.

But then, a little more than 4 years ago, I became a mother. I didn’t have to be excluded from Mother's Day anymore, I realized—I would get cards! And I have—hastily scribbled by my son, with Thomas the Tank Engine stickers affixed haphazardly. I have been allowed back into a club from which I’d long been excluded.

A bit more than a year ago, I became a mother again—this time to a girl. I am half of a mother-daughter pair again, and this reality has churned up a longing I haven’t felt in years. I remember the things my mother and I liked to do together—the leisurely lunches and shopping trips, punctuated with laughter and gossip—and I imagine doing those things with my daughter. I remember how we could confide in each other our deepest worries—mine usually about a boy I was pining after, hers substantially deeper, often about her aging parents—and I imagine doing that with my daughter. I think about all the things we never got to do, the parts of our relationship we never got to explore—her giving me parenting advice, me helping her mourn the loss of a parent—and I imagine having all that with my daughter. So much seems possible.

And yet, I know I can’t—shouldn’t—recreate with my children the relationship I had with my mother. Maybe my daughter won’t like shopping. Maybe my son won’t email so often. And that’s okay—we’ll do other things. We’ll have different catchphrases, different inside jokes.

What I do hope stays the same is the feeling I had, when I would come home late on weekend nights as a teenager and my mother would be waiting up for me on the living room couch. She wasn’t waiting to make sure I didn’t miss curfew—she simply couldn’t sleep soundly until she knew I was home, safe. At the time, I teased her for being neurotic, but even then, it felt like a warm hug. That’s what my mother gave me, above everything else: the feeling that she was looking out for me, cheering me on, loving me with such purpose. I hope I can give my children that; to know that I had would be the best kind of gift.