Lumus
also kuebiko, and lockheartedness. And eisce too.
and maybe ‘scrying’?
There’s a few different ways I like to find my words for my Friday essays. I often come across interesting words and definitions from my many nerdy nodes in my own cultivated (world wide) web of daily readings. I do keep a Note on my phone that has images of these attached in it, so if I’m coming up short I can pan for word gold there. Another way I find cool words to contemplate is something I call word scrying.
For you non-witchy types: scrying refers to a magical process in which the seeker gazes into a crystal, or a pool (like Galadriel’s pool that shows revelations), or some such malleable magic thingie, and extracts meaning out of what they find there. I think the word comes from a version of ‘seeing’? I think?
And so when I do word scrying specifically, I’ll randomly scroll through my Note, or flip through a word book, like a dictionary, thesaurus, or encyclopedia, and choose what Fate (or my fingers) have randomly landed on. This time, I did this scrying game on the toilet with the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.
I’ve written about this book and its frustrating beauty before, in another vocab word piece where I talked about Vemödalen. In that essay, I talk about the journey of that book’s publication and how much I long for such a success story myself:
What’s it about? Well, it’s a series of new and unusual words to denote different emotions. Kenopsia is one of them. What else?
It’s a NYT bestseller, for one thing. It started as a blog, before it blew up and morphed bigger on YouTube. John Green gave it a favorable nod. It gained wider notice and got picked up by a Big 5 publisher from there. Because of course it did.
Now, my vocab word Fridays here on Zuko’s Musings don’t really seem all that special anymore, do they?
At least I know this sort of thing is popular with publishers and readers. Or can be. Or is already, for this other dude. Sigh. … (Zuko, Zuko’s Musings: Vemödalen)
How this particular sesh of scrying for today worked was: I flipped through the above book and landed here (pictured). All three of these words came up, and as they’re all visible in this page spread, and as I read them all together, they are linked in my mind, as far as my feelings and state of being at this moment in my life and in history. And my observations of the world around me. Also, the word whose definition overlaps onto this page: it’s a sign that it should be included, surely? So I’ve added it to my treasure trove of words from this one flipping. So here we are, with not one but four vocab words to consider. You tell me how you believe they’re connected. I’ll tell you how I think they are so, as we go.
Lumus
Definition: ‘The poignant humanness beneath the spectacle of society.’ (Koenig, p.127)
Maybe it’s because my entire life has involved creating spectacle in the form of theatre making (especially live theatre), along with the discipline of skill-building to be able to do it well, that I don’t find the humanness to be that hidden, that ‘underneath,’ the spectacle. I know very well, when performing online or onstage, that I’m human withal—not underneath the show, but above it and through it and around and within it, as myself. Acting training, after all, isn’t about how to lie skillfully, but how to incorporate your own self into the art you’re doing, whether it’s realism or spectacle. Whether I’m wearing authentic period clothing or a sword or nothing but sparkly undies, I’m human, and if I’m doing my art right, my humanness is right there as part of the show.
Maybe this is why I took to the performative display of ‘the spectacle of society’ that is social media early on, and well. I look at it as a sort of curation of the art that is an image of me, similar to how I cast acts for the variety show Blue Dime Cabaret. I don’t feel that it damages me, maybe because I am so experienced as a showman and playmaker—it feels like I’m creating an ongoing one-woman show, or a more spectacular version of a memoir. I don’t live in the circus, I put it up for people’s enjoyment and enjoy it myself, but it doesn’t absorb my humanness into its artificial self; quite the contrary.
‘The circus is so big and bright and loud, it’s easy to believe that that’s the real world and that you live somewhere outside it. But beneath all these constructed ideals, there is a darker heart of normalcy, a humble humanness, that powers the whole thing. We’re all just people. We go to work and play our roles as best we can, spinning our tales and performing or tricks, but then we take off our makeup and go home, where we carry on with our real lives. None of us really knows what we’re doing, where we’re going, or why. Still we carry on, doing what we can to get through it.’ (Koenig, p.128-9) (emphasis my own)
I do also recognize and speculate that if I had had social media back when I was a teenager, it would have been wildly damaging to me, theatre kid though I was. But there’s no way to know that. Maybe in this day and age of soul-sucking and addictive self displays of the socials, the dark carnival of which having even leached into our governing bodies, the theatre people will be the last ones left sane. Such as we are.
Kuebiko
Definition: a Japanese kami (minor deity) of agriculture, country wisdom, and knowledge. It manifests as a sentient scarecrow with no legs.
The creepy thing about this little Shinto god is that paradox of it being all-knowing, and ever-watching, but unable to move from its place. Unable to take any action whatsoever, only to know. It’s also known as the god of scholarship and knowledge, and that fact just sends chills down my spine. Isn’t that what we (especially scholars and intellects) are feeling right now in the wake of this election? It illustrates my mood exactly. How did this happen, and what can we do? Nothing. All we can do is watch.
Lockheartedness
Definition: the closeness and camaraderie that happens when people are forced into a place together and stuck there.
This is exactly what happens when creating a piece of theatre, particularly a play that requires rehearsals and construction/collection of various things like sets, costumes, and props. It’s such insanely hard work, and nobody who works that hard on a common goal will ever be closer, even if they never see any of them again afterward. I imagine this is the ‘band of brothers’ feeling that military folks feel. Any servicemembers or veterans reading this, chime in and let me know.
SIDE NOTE: re: Gilderoy Lockheart: this lovely definition about a lovely thing that happens when a community bands together (whether consenting or no), made me wonder why the Harry Potter character is named that. On the one hand, I must remind myself and you all that (I think?) all the words in the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows are not curated only, but coined by the author. So of course this version of the word (a combination of locked up and fullheartedness, as is claimed on p.126) not only would have been unknown by Rowling, but it wouldn’t have even been conjured by Koenig that long ago. So. But anyway. You HP lectio divinators have a ball with this meaning, wanna? But the name itself is interesting too: gilded, meaning golden; roy from royalty or king (French roi); and then lockheart. That could mean a locket in the shape of a heart, hiding a secret, or a locked heart that doesn’t love. All of which would be appropriate descriptions for the arrogant fraud obsessed with himself that Gilderoy was.
Eisce
Definition: This is a weird one: it’s relating to a contradiction of feeling both very small and yet very consequential to the world (and especially the people) around you.
It’s a weird combo to describe, but it’s so potent: that every time I do the fabled ‘Colorado-passing-hiker-smile-and-nod’ that little, even unconscious, thing may impact that person for at least the rest of their day, if not more. Each footprint I leave in the snow joins hundreds if not thousands more, and yet it makes the grass poke through in that particular my-foot-shaped way as soon as the melt begins.
‘A role both vanishingly small but also somehow daunting, making it that much harder to complain about the traffic, knowing that you are traffic.’ (Koenig, p.126)
It’s easy to fall into kuebiko, lament and be angered by the smallness in our eisce, or to protect oneself in isolation and distraction. But in these difficult times in particular, it’s important to stay malleable (yet tough) and most especially, to reinforce community, by remembering lumus and embracing lockheartedness. I love you. Stay safe. Comment below. Punch a N*zi.
SOURCES:
Koenig, John. The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. NYC: Simon & Schuster, 2021. p. 125-129.
Kuebiko. Wikipedia. Accessed 11.14.2024. (Link)
NOTE: while I did reference a character from J.K. Rowling’s second Harry Potter book (Chamber of Secrets), I am of the practice of not letting her suck any more air out of any more rooms, and so I will not be fully citing it here. As an English and Literature professor, I do recognize the immense cultural impact of the books, as much as I observe the literary quality of them is quite low. I do follow a couple podcasts on the oeuvre, one of the more interesting of which is hosted by a political science professor, who thereby analyzes characters and events through that lens. Continuing the cultural conversation in this way is, I feel, still a good thing to do, as much as the words and monies of the author are not. Your mileage may vary, death of the author, blah blah blah…
I think the sobering thing here is when you talk about the depth of training, knowledge and experience that lets you navigate social media (relatively) unscathed, and then realize that there are tens of millions of people out there without any of that, and for many of whom social media is literally their only source of information…anyway it just leads to a really long sentence, unfortunately, which is rapidly running out of steam, but you know where I’m going. I hope. Ish.