Collecting Words

I recently joined a new forum on bravewriter.com that has really expanded my scope in writing. I'm very excited with the new activities Rachel has shown to me.

One of the things is Word Collecting, something I wcould not have ever thought up on my own. Throughout our everyday lives we are confonted with new words. New ones, old ones, descriptive ones, cliches...but some words strike us more than others. Even words like "simmer" and "yeast" are enough to spark your imagination.

To begin word collecting, you carry a notebook around with you (unless you are not like me and you remember things easily) Everytime you hear a word that you feel is worth writing dow, you do it. No matter how silly it seems. Soon you will end up with pages full of word columns. Some will relate to eachother somehow or sound the same or have the same first letter, but most are just completely random. Thats when it gets the most fun.

Then you take the very best words and put them on strips of index cards. The words are then sorted into any way you like and put in envelopes. The freedom of word collecting is very refreshing!

Here are some of my favorite words. They were collected in a very short period of time so my list needs a lot of restocking :)

insurrection

misinformed

supersede

comradery

depredations

weightless

diversity

provisionally speaking

woe is me

overwhelmed

sizzle

slightly

staircase

simmer

ruins

lovelorn

twinkle

strawberry-blonde

Happy Birthday:Hau 'oli la hanau (Hawaiian)

Frohe Geburtstag (German)

Feliz cumpleaños (Spanish)

Charleston

Spanish Moss

oak trees

letters to home

colonelcy

sacrifice

abolitionist

sheltered

comfortable

restless

assumptions

onliest

states rights

humid

fear of failure

factoid

frivolity

fidelity

fearless

freedom

Forward Fifty Fourth!

flag bearer

foremost

ultra-violet

fun, wild and untamed

cosmic pond