Changing My Favorite Punctuation Mark
Writing without punctuation is like hieroglyphics confusing do you see what I mean. Proper punctuation brings order and meaning. As the workhorses of everyday writing, commas, periods, question marks, exclamation points and hyphens generate little fanfare.
But consider the "en dash," which in the days of manual typesetting was about as long as the width of a lowercase "n." Highlighted in the widely circulated poem "The Dash," the en dash separates the years of birth and death on a tombstone. Though more precise, I'd guess a title like "The Em Dash" would never have spawned the same poetic buzz.
Though I didn't realize it then, my favorite punctuation mark actually began to court me as I learned Morse code more than 40 years ago. The Morse character I most enjoyed sending was the "double dash," formed by purposely running together the letters B and T: dash-dot-dot-dot-dash.
Unlike the cumbrous period and comma, BT flowed smoothly from my key, shorthand strokes for easily separating thoughts. And my favorite punctuation mark--do you see what I mean?--has the same effect of breaking one written thought to insert another.
This longest member of the dash family, the "em dash," is as long as the width of a lowercase "m." Regular readers may have noticed how I tend to liberally sprinkle these oddities throughout almost every column. In the olden days when manual typewriters didn't have an em dash character, two consecutive hyphens served that purpose.
But despite my persistent affinity for this peculiar symbol, a change is overdue.
Just last Friday as I hustled to complete my entries for a contest, interruptions unexpectedly, persistently inserted themselves into the smooth flow of work. Like em dashes, they compelled me to shift gears, to redirect my focus away from the mainstream thought process.
So I now contemplate a new favorite mark to punctuate both life and writing: the ellipsis. Though you may not know the name, you've seen the ellipsis on the job. It denotes a pause ... a breather ... a moment for gathering wits ... until something else happens.
And that's precisely what I need right now. I had once envisioned that my retirement from "full-time" employment would be tastefully seasoned with ellipses: time to think ... time to regroup ... time to rest.
Not so. Life's em dashes have joggled me up and down like a bobber on choppy seas. Even Jesus admonished His disciples to draw themselves apart and rest awhile.
My doctor didn't discover the cause of my curious bouts of dizziness, reminiscent of similar spells about 25 years ago. But if I'd simply suggested that "life has too many em dashes" as the cause, I'm certain he'd have immediately diagnosed dementia.
And though the em dash has befriended me--more than four decades now-- I'm seeking ways to ease him out. But I wonder how....
Copyright 2004 James McAlister
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