Supercalafragilisticexpialidocious!

Showing off. It’s a big reason that I like to write. I consider myself to be an intelligent person, and what’s the point of being that if no one else can ever see any evidence of it? Making it known in conversation can be tricky though, that requires a level of wit that I have yet to fully grasp, and verbally it is easy to come off as though not only to I think that I am intelligent, but that I think I have to prove it, or that I believe myself to be more intelligent than those around me. (That’s definitely not always the case.) Writing is a bit different though.

When I’m writing I can let the words come as they may, celebrating for myself the moments that they come very quickly, and not caring if it takes me 20 minutes to figure out the precise word to express the correct sentiment. I can take the time to show off the expansive vocabulary that I am proud of, and even expand it further when the right word is just out of grasp but a thesaurus is not. Finding the right phrasing and proving a point in the black and white print of the page is not something that someone can “one-up” me on in the moment, and if I do it right; they can’t really “one-up” me at all.

Vocabulary is really a big motivator though. I love knowing a lot of words and using them. When writing a paper I can look them up again and make sure that I am using them in the correct context, rather than throwing them out there in conversation and risk someone knowing that I just completely bastardized the actual meaning of the word. Sure, the look on someone’s face when I use a word that they obviously don’t know is pretty awesome, but is it worth that risk of being found out and not quite as clever as I was trying to show myself to be? I don’t think so, I’ll stick to the written form.

I think that everyone has something to show off with their writing, whether it be good ideas, or kick ass arguments, or a vocabulary that completely eclipses mine, I can’t wait to see what will develop in a student’s writing throughout a semester and what other people enjoy showing off!