More 'Just Thinking' Pieces
Incredibe
Announcing A Death
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It’s been a 40-year slaughter, but this beautiful word is now dead. It lies on the floor of our vocabularies, hacked to pieces.
I remember the early days of this massacre. Or rather my first awareness of it, of my participation in it, actually. I was in a meeting, and when I used the word, the director rebuked me for using it, saying that what I was describing was not incredible at all, that it was, if anything, quite believable, which made it so dangerous. It was a rough reproach, but I felt grateful a few hours later.
And I’ve been listening ever since. I’ve been careful with my use of the word. But I’ve also been keeping an ear out for others’ misuse of it, seeking company in my humiliation, I guess.
And they have been there, misuse after misuse – everywhere. Eventually I could not keep track of the hackings. “Incredible this,” “incredible that.” People seemed unable to find a single other word for whatever they found unusual or implausible or shocking or dazzling or staggering or unthinkable or half-baked or stunning or gorgeous or outlandish or or or or. Everything was “incredible.”
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Last week I had had it. Some of the finest minds in journalism, including Rory Stewart, used it multiple times in one brief interview, and that was it for me. I had to write about it. I had to protest. I had to do something! So here I am.
And here you are. Might we do something together? Might we follow the three-part directive for change: 1) stop, 2) breathe, 3) act? Could at least you and I 1) never say “incredible” again unless the thing we are describing truly cannot be fathomed by the human mind? Can we just otherwise stop saying the word?
Then can we 2) take a breath and think about this winsome word. Can we gaze at its etymology and breathe some more?
Then 3) can we act? Can we use “incredible” only to describe things like the 93-billion-mile diameter of the universe, or the “zero-size” of a quark, or the sudden emergence from a two-year coma, or the way a smile changes a whole day, or the voice after death of someone we love? But otherwise, could we leave the word, this most meritorious and meticulous word, alone?
Because maybe it is not dead. Maybe it is just waiting for the Prince of Moderation to blow a kiss and put the pieces back together. Maybe one day it can stand before us again in all its golden glory. Maybe we can actually mean it when we say it.
Isn’t that the least we can ask of ourselves, the only word-gifted sentient beings on earth?
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