My vocation is to help people understand things. This is different from “explaining things”; when you “explain”, the person to whom you are explaining is passive. Helping people understand things is collaborative; I want to engage with the audience, not just lecture them. I don’t want them to be a passive receiver of verbiage. I want to provide the steps on which they climb to a higher level of comprehension. In my particular case, this is through technical writing, but I do try hard to apply this in all aspects where it’s needed. Explaining things to my autistic child, for example.

So words are my stock in trade. I operate in words in a way similar to how a sculptor might work in marble, or a painter in, well, paint. I craft words into information, and try to make it engaging and helpful. It’s how I earn my daily bread.

As you might expect from someone who has been crafting information in this way for a few decades, I have some strong opinions on words and phrases in regular use. Some delight me; some drive me nuts. And I wanted to share that a bit.

Almost everyone has some word or turn of phrase that drives them nutty. Online in social media lately you can see people mixing up “your” and “you’re” all the time, and you can see it driving lots of other people absolutely nutty. (Hint: I am your friend because you’re a good person. Extrapolate.)

I first got a hint of this in my high school English class, where my favorite teacher Mr. Rodriquez—one of two English teachers who encouraged my writing ability, and to both of whom I owe a huge debt—was driven crazy when a student used the word, “nice”. “‘Nice’ how?!” he would bellow. “In what way is it ‘nice’? What makes it ‘nice’? Then use those words! ‘Nice’ is useless!” I don’t necessarily agree, but it definitely doesn’t speak well of a word when it’s lexicography is:

late 13c., “foolish, ignorant, frivolous, senseless,” from Old French nice (12c.) “careless, clumsy; weak; poor, needy; simple, stupid, silly, foolish,” from Latin nescius “ignorant, unaware,” literally “not-knowing,” from ne- “not” (from PIE root *ne- “not”) + stem of scire “to know” (see science).

OED

Not very “nice” at all, is it? It drove poor Mr. Rod batty when we used it. (So of course some wags did it deliberately. Fortunately, he had a sense of humor.)

For my dad, it was “irregardless”. “It’s not a word!” he would say. “Why not just say ‘regardless’?” And I had to admit I had a point.

These and similar types of lessons encouraged me to not only be careful in which words I chose, but to make sure I didn’t choose one because it sounded “fancier” (“Irregardless!”) in the hopes it made me look clever. Don’t use “jejune” instead of “boring”, for example. Sure, sprinkle those kinds of word in your fiction to give it flavor, but just like you want a little cayenne in your gumbo, too much of that kind of thing makes it unpalatable.

As a bit of a contrast, author Dan Simmons is driven insane by the current use of “decimate” as equivalent to “utterly destroyed”. As Simmons points out, “decimate” comes from the Latin, meaning “to destroy one part in ten” (“deci” is from the Latin for “ten”). I understand his frustration. But despite many writers and grammarians desire to the contrary, English is a living language, words evolve, and sometimes they take on new meanings that don’t necessarily jibe well with their lexicographical origins. Almost everyone uses “decimate” as an equivalent for “utterly destroy” these days; Simmons’ efforts to the contrary, I think that ship has sailed. (Though personally, I use synonyms like “annihilate” or some such.)

What about me? Well, my “word irritation” comes from both a lack of precision in how these words are used, and the fact they in one case, it’s just wrong.

The first bone of contention is the sloppy way so many people use the words “couple” and “few”, often as if they’re synonyms. They’re not! “Couple” means “two”. That’s it; two. No more, no less. And yet some people mean it as if it’s equivalent to “a handful” or “a bunch” or “a few”. It makes me insane. No. It’s two. “A few” is “more than a couple.” Personally, I only use “a few” when it’s between three and ten, but I don’t expect everyone else to adhere to my OCD-enabled needs. (After “a few” comes “a bunch”, followed by “a lot”. But again, that’s me.)

A small digression: I apply similar precision to “probably” and “maybe”. “Maybe” means 50/50; “probably” for me is “a greater than 50% chance”. I know some people use them interchangeably; I don’t.

The other thing that’s been driving me batty on social media lately is when people want to make an exclamation of cuteness. That word, kids, is “Aw.” That’s what you saw when you see a cute cat video, or a baby smiles at you. NOT “awe”, which is “a feeling of reverential respect mixed with fear or wonder.” They’re not the same, and you need to stop using them as if they were!

Words have meanings, kids. And while yes, those meanings do evolve (much though it may frustrate Dan Simmons), if you want to communicate, if you want to help people understand what you’re saying, it’s important to use the right words. So think before you speak.

So tell me: What words or phrases drive you crazy? (And tell me if you want a similar rant on grammar, which I will entitle “Why We Shouldn’t Give a Damn About Split Infinitives, and Other Grammar Rules Doug Ignores”.)

When we are growing up, we just don’t question the individual character traits of our parents. They are who they are, sort of like the sun and the moon. Their actions are all-but-incomprehensible, how they developed into the people you experience a mystery. They just…are.

One of the major changes a person goes through is when they realize their parents are actual people, with thoughts and feelings and histories and motivations. It can be painful, or lead to conflict, especially when our parents are very different from the person we are developing into. We saw this on a societal level during the 1960s, when many of the Boomers revolted against the strictures—social, sexual, behavioral—under which their parents and grandparents had operated for decades. (That the Boomers, in Stephen King’s words, “could have changed the world and instead settled for the Home Shopping Network” is a whole different topic.)

My Dad has been gone for nearly a quarter-century now, taken at age 63 by colon cancer that he, in classic Silent Generation fashion, dismissed the warning signs of. (“If you ever see blood in your urine or stool, Doug, be sure to tell the doctor,” was his conclusion. The entire extended Moran family went for colonoscopies after he died.) And yet his influence over me has remained and, if anything, deepened in the intervening years.

As I have aged towards grandparenthood my own self, I have had a lot of cause to reflect on these influences. And one of the biggest I’ve noticed recently, in the aftermath of being laid off, is how I connect with people.

When I was little, I never considered it at all remarkable that my dad could chat just as easily with janitors, sanitation workers, and gardeners as he could with Admirals, Congressmen, and his engineering colleagues. He was DAD, and he did what he did. It’s only in the last few years I’ve come to realize both how remarkable a skill that was, and how much of it he passed on to me.

Recently, I was laid off from my job. This always comes as a shock when you’re a high performer with heavy expectations for yourself. Though of course at my age in this particular industry—high tech—which is notoriously both sexist and ageist, it wasn’t totally surprising. High tech is going through a lemming-like period right now where everyone is laying people off because…everyone is laying people off. The executives say it’s to cut costs and prepare for a (presumed) upcoming economic downturn. I don’t believe that for a moment. To me it’s clear that companies are doing it because other companies are doing it, with a side hope that this will relieve some of the pressure put on employers to be more reasonable to workers recently. They want their power back.

(I’m sure people like Larry Summers would go to great lengths to convince people I’m wrong. Fortunately, he doesn’t even know I exist, so it’s not a big worry on my part.)

Why am I mentioning this? Because I have been absolutely astounded at how many people have reached out tell me how shocked they are; how they can’t believe my company would lay me off; how it’s a stupid move on the part of my company; asking how they can help. This isn’t just friends; it’s coworkers, former coworkers, and even distant acquaintances. I received the following text from a person I am embarrassed to admit I can’t remember at all:

I’m not putting this in to brag—or not much—but rather to note that, somehow, I seem to make an impact on people, and they remember me. People from jobs I worked at 15 years ago are reaching out. People I’ve never actually physically met. I make connections somehow.

Like my Dad did.

I have only recently realized that my tendency to chat with anyone and everyone, to try to make connections, find shared experiences (“Oh really? I was born in Connecticut!”), ask people about their backgrounds, interests, and thoughts, is something I acquired from my Dad. It’s something I picked up subconsciously. Something that I have never, ever thought about, and that I’m incredibly grateful for.

People are interesting! Almost all people. And it is the incredibly rare person I run into who I haven’t found some kind of connection with. You’re from the Canary Islands? Don’t they speak French there? I’ve been to France and speak really bad French; can we speak French? Oh, you’re Jewish, too? Oh, you like to dance West Coast Swing? You like Lord of the Rings too? How old were you when you first read it? Really? Wow; that’s young! Like my dad, I don’t care if they’re a garbage collector or a CEO; a sewer worker or a high-ranking naval officer; a teacher or a waiter or a phone support person. They all have lives, they all have stories, there’s almost always something in common.

I’d like to say “I make the effort,” but really, it doesn’t feel like an effort. It’s something I’ve done for almost as long as I can remember.

And now that I’m a bit on my heels from being laid off, I’m finding that this gift I received basically by osmosis from my Dad is something that actually gives back. That’s not why I do it; it’s not a transactional kind of thing at all. I do it because I enjoy it. Because it’s part of me. And it’s just incredibly gratifying to find out, so many years on, that people appreciate it.

I have gone through most of my life thinking I basically blend into the background, don’t make a mark on the groups and organizations I’m part of, that I’m essentially the Invisible Man. This was engrained in me in Middle and High School, where it was absolutely true; when I wasn’t being ignored, I was being bullied. That this changed significantly in college, and a very different experience has been true since I started working in high tech, just completely escaped me.

To all you people out there who think well of me, I just want to thank you. Finding out after so long is an incredible blessing.

Lord give me the serenity…

For a while there were numerous articles on a phenomenon that the press labeled “quiet quitting.” (Why am I convinced that term was generated by management and not workers?) If you read these articles, there really isn’t any “quitting” involved; people are still perfectly willing to do their jobs, no matter how crappy. What they’re not willing to do is extra, unpaid work that is outside of the scope of their job. They’re not willing to do work before clocking in; they’re not willing to take on extra responsibility without being recognized for it (preferably with a promotion); they’re not willing to work extra shifts when they’re ill, and especially not feeling as if they have to be on the hook to find someone to cover their shifts when ill (that’s what you’re getting paid for, managers).

And this is being called “quiet quitting.”

When I started work in earnest after I got my degree in computer science at 22, I had been working in the service industry for 7 years. I had put myself through college with service jobs; kept myself fed and clothed with service jobs; and was acutely aware of just how many employers tried to abuse their power in squeezing more work out of you for free. (In fact, I think everyone should be required to work in—and live off the pay of—hourly service jobs for at least a year before they take on a non-service job. And anyone getting an MBA should have to put in an additional year.)

My first day on the job in high tech, one of my coworkers, as part of his training, told me, “Well, we’re scheduled to work 8 hours/day, but you’ll get lots of overtime.” And I thought, “Yeah, no way.” And then and there I came up with three rules for my work-life balance that I have stayed with to this day:

1. No overtime
2. No working lunches
3. No trade magazines on my free time

(I think the implementation of “brown-bag lunches”, where execs schedule a talk during lunch time and strongly hint you should give up your lunchtime to attend, is yet another example of management trying to squeeze workers. My lunchtime in mine; you want my attention, you go ahead and pay me for it.)

Word, Agent Sully

Now yes, I have occasionally broken those rules in extremis. I’ve attended working lunches, mostly for political reasons (ie to make my team look good in front of an executive). I’ve read some articles in trade magazines, but almost always on company time. And while I have sometimes stayed late or worked weekends because of the press of events, it is extremely rare.

Plenty of people have told me over the last 35+ years that I was limiting myself by being so stringent; that I would get poor performance reviews, wouldn’t get promoted, wouldn’t get bonuses, etc. And that’s turned out to be nonsense; not only have I gotten raises, promotions, bonuses, and accolades, I have regularly been tagged as a top performer. I’m not saying this to brag; I’m pointing out you can have a good work-life balance and do solid work that gets appreciated.

What aggravates me with the current situation is this: Workers finally have some leverage with business, and business is whining that they’re using that power to demand a reasonable work-life balance. And I’m actually thrilled that Millennials and GenZers are fighting back against the soul-sucking demands of pushy, fascistic, out-of-control managers. That the workforce is saying, “Enough!” is nothing but healthy, in my opinion.

I want to make clear that I don’t believe all management are pushy, fascistic, and out-of-control. But far too many, especially in service jobs, absolutely are. (Read any story about Elon Musk for examples.) You have all read the stories about Amazon drivers urinating in bottles, and factory fulfillment people being monitored by the second. Or Walmart workers forced to do work off the clock. Restaurant workers made to feel guilty for not coming in and working while sick. That’s absurd. It shouldn’t be borne. And I’m glad to see fewer and fewer people are accepting it. Because you don’t have to.

So those are my three rules. What are yours? And how have they worked out for you?

The wisdom of Stephen King

I turn 60 this year. And like plenty of folks my age (and most of my friends), my body is doing its best to betray me by falling apart and attempting to cripple me with various maladies.

The first warning of this—well, “decline” is the only word that fits—was when I was 36, the same year my dad died (at only 63, of prostate cancer). I have read that many people of a physical/athletic bent experience an injury sometime in their 30s that marks the changeover from young to “guess I’m starting to get old.” For me, it was when I was skeet-shooting with my Pop (my father-in-law, this is), and I blew out a disk in my neck. The subsequent massive pain was almost unbelievable, and forced me to get the disk removed and two vertebrae clamped in place.

And consigned me to chronic neck pain for the rest of my life. Not to mention robbing me of feeling in two of my left fingers.

When your doctor tells you, “You shouldn’t lift anything heavier than a half-gallon of milk” (thought the doctor in Texas changed this to “a six pack of beer”), it gets your attention. When you ask if you can continue to ski and are told, “Well, sure, if you don’t mind risking permanent paralysis,” it focuses the mind. Yup.

And of course that accelerated in my 40s and 50s, as it tends to do. My neck is curving under the influence of gravity and my injury. I have “essential tremors”. Almost exactly two and a half years ago, I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. A year ago I had bilateral pulmonary embolisms (“blood clots in the lungs” to you, my friend). Late last year, my eye doctor notified me I have cataracts (“But not bad enough for insurance to pay for surgery,” she said helpfully). My knees have been a tragic wreck since a soccer injury at 17. And so it goes.

And you know what? Fuck it. Get busy living, or get busy dying.

It would be spectacularly easy to give in to these various maladies and setbacks and just declare defeat, as my ex seemingly has done after her stroke. But that is just not me. I hurt. I fucking ache all the time, to be perfectly frank. AND I DON’T CARE. Ima live life anyway.

I mean, of course I “care”. I see my doctors; I get scans; I take blood pressure meds, and blood thinning meds, and cholesterol meds, and god knows what else is in my pill organizer. I try to follow my doctors’ advice (which is hard, because sometimes it conflicts). I go in for regular appointments and checkups and get the tests they say I need—at least to the point where insurance and money won’t pay. I’m not stupid.

But Ima live my life, dammit.

Time of your life, eh kid?

I can’t play soccer, or ultimate frisbee, or even swim or play frisbee golf? To heck with it; I’ll learn how to dance! I can’t see my besties regularly because they are scattered all over the durn place? To heck with it; I’ll schedule regular Zoom DnD sessions with them so we can hang like we used to in college!

Yes, I’m pushing 60 (quite hard), and yes my body can’t do what it used to, and yes, I face certain physical limitations.

I’m going to get busy living. What about you?