Editor�s Note

My mom was a teacher, so she spent most of every day dealing with children. By the time she got home, she just wasn�t in the mood to handle more kid problems. I really don�t blame her. It must have been tough to teach all day and then have to deal with an overly inquisitive child of her own in the evening.

Whenever I had a question about something I�d heard on the news or seen in a movie, I�d ask my mother about it. A lot of times these questions had to do with what certain words meant. Mom�s inevitable response was �look it up.� After some grumbling about the general unfairness of having to think for myself, I�d head to the dictionary or encyclopedia to find the answer to my question. Remember kids, this was in the days before the Internet, when we actually used books for something other than starting campfires or propping up the uneven leg of the sofa.

While Mom�s method of getting me out of her face might not have given me the quick answer I wanted, it certainly did teach me a lot. It�s amazing how many other questions can pop up in the course of looking for an answer.

Take for instance the time Mom told me that I was being obstreperous � a complaint that she often had. Being 10 years old, I had no idea what the word obstreperous meant. Sensing the tone in her voice, I knew that it probably wasn�t complimentary and also realised that rather than push my luck by asking what she meant, I�d just forgo the drama and head straight for the dictionary.

Here�s what I found: ob.strep.er.ous (adj): resisting control or restraint in a difficult manner; unruly

Hmm ... While I knew some of those words, there were a few that I didn�t really understand. This set me off on a new quest to look up the words in the definition that I didn�t know. Sometimes looking up those words lead me to looking up the unknown words in those definitions. This process could sometimes take hours. Oddly enough, it worked out well for everybody in the family. Mom got some much needed downtime, and I got to learn not just a whole lot of new words but also that my mother thought I was naughty.

Eventually I started looking things up without my mother�s prodding. I actually used to spend hours poring over the dictionary or discovering in the encyclopedia the unlikely connections between things as disparate as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Peking duck � and trust me, there is a way to connect them in just six steps.

With the Internet, finding information has become a lot easier. And just like those old days, I still find myself taking up hours of my time looking things up � sometimes for work; sometimes just for fun. It�s funny how useful driving your mother crazy can end up being.

Sean Vale
Editor
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