Babel

I’m never sick except for an occasional chest cold, maybe once a year, so to be as ill as I was is a new experience for me. The phrase for “I totally don’t get it” is generally considered to be, “It’s all Greek to me”, but when it comes to medical nomenclature I’ve got to stick with, “It’s all Latin to me”. The named diagnosis, the procedures to get to the diagnosis and the medicine to treat the unpronounceable illness can have one scratching his head wishing someone would simply write it down in plain English to be understood. Like other professionals, the medical field has its buck and a quarter words that only they use, but in the end what matters is that their work brought about a healing of which I’m grateful. I do have to say, everyone I encountered, be it at our little hospital or at the medical institute, had a compassionate attitude and went out of their way to be of service to all their patients. I can’t say I would want to repeat the experience right away, but my attitude toward the profession is more trusting today.
When it comes to words and language, I don’t guess there’s any more confusing than English. In the publication, “Hints on Pronunciation for Foreigners” by T.S.W., there appears this little poem: I take it you already know of tough and bough and cough and dough. Others may stumble, but not you, on hiccough, thorough, lough, and through. Well done! And now you wish, perhaps, to learn of less familiar traps? Beware of heard, a dreadful word that looks like beard and sounds like bird. And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead – for goodness sake don’t call it “deed”! Watch out for meat and great and threat. (They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.) A moth is not a moth in mother; Nor both in bother, or broth in brother. And hear is not a match for there nor dear and fear for bear and pear. And then there’s dose and rose and lose – just look them up – and goose and choose. And cork and card and ward, and font and word and sword, and do and go and thwart and cart. Come, come, I’ve hardly made a start! A dreadful language? Man alive! I’d mastered it when I was five. (I’m still working on it)
An old man was having a discussion with his new doctor. “I’ve sure gotten old! I’ve had two bypass surgeries, a hip replacement, and new knees; fought prostrate cancer and diabetes. I’m half blind, can’t hear anything quieter than a jet engine, take forty different medications that make me dizzy, winded and subject to blackouts. I have bouts with dementia, have poor circulation and can hardly feel my hands and feet anymore. I can’t remember if I’m 85 or 92 and I’ve lost all my friends. But, I’m thankful for one thing – I’ve still got my drivers license.”
[Genesis 11: 1-9] Mankind has almost come full circle. A universal language is permeating business and commerce throughout the world and it must be learned to compete. Man is seeking total reliance on himself thus attempting to build a world without God. Mankind is forever seeking self gratification, to make a name for his-self, not acknowledging the Creator, without whom we would have nothing. Science is the discovery of the wonders of our great and awesome God, yet man strives to put God in a box and prove he is smarter than God. Ain’t gonna happen! Search for the edge of the universe and look for the smallest particle all you want, you’re not going to find it. God will continue to baffle man, attempting to reconcile a broken relationship. Those who seek God first find love and a less competitive world in any language. Understandable?