Working it out

It occurred to me on my way home from my Curves gym that no-one was going to pick up the reference in the earlier post about Art Linkletter's tv show, Kids Say the Darndest Things.  I probably dated myself--a sort of innocuous faux pas, I thought...until I got home to find an email from someone apparently not willing to comment here, saying that my posts were "pretentious pieces of crap."  Well, my writing has been called worse.  After all, we can't all be Margaret Atwood.  On the other hand, I could have written a much more scathing critique than he did, "crap" not really being a strong descriptor of anything at all. For example, I would have said that my blog was no more than a "bog of pretentious discourses written by a jaded and somewhat cynical mind."  Or:  "a pedantic, self-important series of musings which, despite the fine language, prove to be pedestrian and boring."  (I especially like the "pedestrian" part.)  And there's the rub.  I love language.  Always have...ever since I was a little girl and would read the dictionary for pleasure.  Using words to express yourself as efficiently as language allows doesn't harbour a slight to others who choose, um, less efficient words to convey whatever is loitering around in their heads.  In fact, you'd think it would have the opposite effect.  Just before my ex and I split, he thanked me.  "What for?" I said.  "For teaching me to talk better," he replied.  I'm not sure how I did that except that I was certainly the more verbal of the two of us.  And, certainly, after he'd spent most of my money and went on to spend most of his mother's money (I've since heard), I can't say that I thought it was all that great a compliment.  I would have preferred keeping my money.