"Spelling Bee" and my Love of Words

I have lately spent too much time playing a NY Times game called "Spelling Bee." You are given seven letters ("S" is forbidden) and try to make as many words as you can that are at least four letters long, all of which must use the letter in the center. Today's is above; there are 44 words, should you feel like trying.

The game can be frustrating because the Times uses their own word list, and it seems completely arbitrary which slang terms they accept, which French words, or even which obscure Anglo-Saxon words about rural life; they accept "tilth" but not "midden." For a while I considered starting a Twitter called "Spelling Bee Accepts", every tweet having the form, "Spelling Bee accepts anyhoo but not alot." But I spend enough time on it already.

It's a good game, but that's not why I play. I play because I love words. I love the way they are assembled from letters and syllables and shorter words, the way they sound, the way they feel in my mouth. I especially love the way they set my thoughts racing off into tangents and stories and memes.

Today's, for example, came to me as the script for an Arthurian spoof along the lines of "Spamalot." I see the bold knights Sir Laughalot, Sir Gloatalot, Sir Galoot and Sir Tall; Sir Hathalot, Sir Hugalot, Sir Toga and Sir Gall. A story pops up featuring a young man competing for the hand of a Christian beauty, saying, "If it's a saint she wants, I'll out-halo them all." A certain kind of long-bearded man of the woods might be goat-tough; fiction with female detectives is tough-gal; one of Odin's names might be All-Thought; a spoof historical romance might be set at Goat Hall. 

Sometimes the words form the names of Goblin chiefs - Ungkazz, Zaknung, etc. – other times the names of aliens from B science fiction, or kingdoms from a mediocre fantasy novel. I glance at the letters and the words start sounding off in my mind. 

My favorite set ever was O in the middle, plus W, R, L, A, M, D, from which I made "Warlord" before I had even finished scanning the set. This launched me into an hour-long reverie of Anglo-Saxon-rooted lore: Doorward, Woodward, Wardoor, Wardoom, Doomwar, Doomwood, Woodlord, Doomdoor, Woodlaw, Doomlaw, Doomlad, Moordoom, Moorwar, Moorlaw, Moorlord. A kind of household lubricant might be called Doorlard; Goat Hall has a secret back entrance called the Moordoor. Which of course connects to Mordor and many other things. This brings me inexpressible joy.

I have listened to four or five people I barely knew tell me about their plans to write books. I remember that two of them wanted to write memoirs because they found their own life stories so compelling, and one wanted to write action novels. I did not believe any of them would ever write a book. They lacked the thing that keeps me writing, that makes it possible for me to spend hours at my keyboard: an affinity for words. I write because I love words, sentences, paragraphs, and the thoughts they inspire. Writing a good sentence can make me happy for hours. Without that pleasure, you would need iron determination to put 80,000 words in order, and the result would probably be hard to read.

It is certainly possible to write a book without any affinity for words; The Hunt for Red October comes to mind. But if you don't love words and can't make them flow, you had better know some awesome stuff and have an awesome story to tell. Your life probably won't cut it.

But to get back to the point: this is why I write. I would love to sell a novel and make some money from it, but really I write because that is how I indulge most intensely my love of words and stories. When I write I immerse myself in words, and in the uncountable connections that stretch out from them to places, people, stories, jokes, scraps of ancient lore and modern science, everything that excites or moves me, everything that makes up my world.