Staring at a screen

While washing dishes, listening to U2, I came to the (re?)realization that words are magic.

Or maaagic, even.

It used to befuddle my mind the idea of magic, as presented in, say, "Buffy" or "Charmed" or most sort of fiction - where people chant words - often Latin, because we all know that the Romans were witches- and voila, instant change.

Pfft, I would think, how can simply uttering random sounds cause anything to happen? And when thought in that way, it doesn't make a bit of sense. Spoken words are simply a combination of the 144 different sounds that the human voicebox is capable of making. (Note: I'm sure I'm making all sorts of scientific errors here. No doubt Jupe will correct me. [wink]) There is nothing inherently special about these sounds - they're simply noise, which the Universe is full of. (If a phrase is uttered and nobody is around to hear it...)

And written words are worse! They're simply symbols for the sounds! If anything, it's a step removed from the 'magicness' of the original noises.

However. It occured to me that words do have power. Both written and spoken words can (and do) alter the brain chemistry (kemistry!) of the individual seeing/hearing them. It's incredible. It's weird beyond comprehension, but it's true.

I don't even think I'm making sense here, because these thoughts aren't even making sense in my head and I know I'm not getting them out there in theright order or in a manner that will send the magic correctly. Alas.

I don't know. I was thinking about words and why they have the power they do. Maybe we aren't meant to understand it, anyway. Who the hell knows? Who the hell knows anything?

In much less thinky news, it's 1:35 in the morning, there are six days left until Halloween, and 13 days left until the new season of The Bimpsons begins. Excellent.