Big Words?
People of lesser intelligence and evolved minds in high school accused me of using "Big Words". Yes, I did...Relative to them.
Why?
Ah, because I was under the mistaken idea that most people were smarter than they actually were...
OMG! Grant! You CAN'T say things like that! It insults people's intelligence!
OMG! Did I actually...SPEAK THE TRUTH?
I went from a 6th grade accelerated program in Racine, Wisconsin in 1969 which compressed the entire 6th grade in a single semester, cleared 3 junior high school subjects in the second semester, and went through quite a number of experimental teaching methods, programs, and such.
That's where I learned how to speed read...Which I've since extended into multi-mode speed reading...
There I was years ago in the Georgia Drivers License Office, taking the computerized driving test...So this guy next to me looks over at me and sees me rather quickly punching out the answers...So being the competitive Level 1 person that he was he tries to keep up with me...And surpass my speed. Pretty obvious...And doomed to failure! So I gave him a look...And upped my speed. I tore through the test extremely quickly, getting one rather ambivalent...
Grant! There's those BIG WORDS again! Can't you use a regular word?
...getting one question that was a bit confusing on it's meaning and thus it's answer wrong...But passing the test in record time...
And smiled/smirked at him and walked away as he was staring at the "Test Failed!" message on his display...
Ok, so you see I morph/segue/Segway (nowadays?) into depth in a detail then give a quaint (interesting?) yet representative story about one aspect of that detail...
Then I come back up...
So in 1969 my old man (not my biological father) suffered intestinal cancer from his exposure to the A-bomb fallout from Nagasaki (his non-wavering story) and died on the operating table at a major hospital in Chicago. They brought him back then lost him again...A couple times. And this was before that was big thing in public knowledge. He suffered brain damage as a result and was never the same again. He when from a hard charging hard drinking very capable VP executive over 2,000 people...To a shadow of his former self. Finally drinking himself to death some years later.
He lost his job, his career, and a lot of his previously sharp mental facilities..."He was never the same after that..." was said by a coworker and friend at his funeral...And he moved the family to East Bumblef*ck, Ill-i-noise.
The term/slang "East Bumblef*ck"...Please excuse the implied swear word but it's intrinsic to this term...Is or was used to describe a very backwards and not very advanced place in the middle of nowhere...
Which described Roscoe, Illinois and also Rockford, Illinois at the time. Nowadays they are probably "thriving metropolises" from all those Chicago city folk and moved up and contaminated those great cities...At least according the natives...
So, there I was surrounded by farm fields, in a very small village where they stared at any and all strangers, and everyone was a cousin due to the inbreeding. The school I found myself in was...Like Green Acres School on a bad (good?) day?
No accelerated program...No credit for my Wisconsin junior high credits...No going to college 2 years early...Etc...Etc...Etc...
"Green acres is the place for me
Farm livin' is the life for me
Land spreadin' out so far and wide
Keep Manhattan, just give me that countryside!"
- The Green Acres TV show theme song.
- See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umS3XM3xAPk
- And be sure to sing along!
Yes, if/when you watch one or two of the TV show episodes you'll get the idea...
It's not humor/humorous when it's actually the situation/hell that you find yourself in...
So, long story short...It ruined my Life in a great many years.
Took me some years but I finally then escaped from there.
My kids would berate me for marrying a wife with such a low IQ/intelligence...Saying that they lost 20-30 IQ points as a result...
Smart and perceptive kids nevertheless...
And...But what could I say?
So, I haven't had many/virtually no people in all the various places where I've lived since mention or criticize me about using "Big Words"...
So you see...It really was a very bad place.