Tongues

My mother has been urging (or berating) me recently to try and relate more to my two young teenage sisters. So I went back through some old journals and read some old writing and found this from 2009.




I dream of words.
I had a dream the other night about the word 'delectable.'
It was soft cotton candy pink and was swirly on the ends of the letters.
It danced beside the rumbling ice cream truck, sporting matching soft cotton candy pink stripes.

Then I dreamt of the "Sahara"- the word slithers off my tongue along with a million hissing snakes. I dreamt of walking alongside huge, bumbling camels. Some of them let me ride on top of the huge bumps on their backs, and we'd bumble along. We all wore long purple and royal blue robes with funny flat hats with red tassels.

The camels were thirsty, so we stopped by a little stream. There, I watched them poke their long pink tongues into the cup I held out to them. In/out/in/out/in/out went their tongues. Who knew a tongue could be so strong? I mimicked them, sticking my tongue out as far as it would go and pressed it up against my own little cup. In/out/in/out/in/out/in/out.

In my dreams, my tongue is the strongest in the world.

Have you ever heard of a man named Cicero? He was a very famous orator way back in ancient Rome. We were told to read a packet on him over Thanksgiving, but I barely skimmed over it the period before. All the information bored my until I yawned and listened to the senior girl tell a senior boy in the row in front of me how she ate bagels, played soccer, and got wasted last weekend.

The only thing I remember from the packet is that Cicero was such an amazing orator he literally moved and forced people to do things with his words. Imagine! To have complete supreme power over someone with just your tongue!

Cicero was once presented a case prosecuting Verres (who's layer was the eminent Hortensius). But Cicero's tongue was so strong, his words were so commanding and passionate, Hortensius withdrew from the case and Verres went into voluntary exile. Imagine! Winning a case with just one speech!

Today at the gym, there was a huge man with huge muscles and huge tattoos lifting weights. But this man had a tiny head and wore tiny Converse.

Imagine! Little, weak me being able to knock him over with my words! I would shoot words like bullets at him.

"kumquat"     "estuary"    "seismic"   "Mississippi"   "Venetian"

My tongue is so strong it can conquer anyone.