A student who spent the entire day arguing with me over email about whether the word “surrealism” is a synonym of the word “subconscious” just sent me an angry rant complaining that I don’t praise her for her effort.
I keep forgetting that I need to exclaim “Good job, sweetie!” whenever I see adults manage to use the potty successfully and tie their shoelaces.
Must be a common trend going on with this latest generation growing up with all this willful ignorance. There’s a reason why Google and Dictionary.com exist!
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I sent the student quotes from dictionaries. But her argument was, “I heard this word used somewhere by somebody.” It is very hard to argue against the authority of somebody somewhere.
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Thank you for making me laugh! I was getting really desperate here. 🙂 🙂
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I’ve had a lot of things in my surrealism recently. One is the possibility of imminent disaster, but that was from watching a documentary of the Japanese tsunami last night. I’m easily traumatised, so things fall into my surrealism like nobody’s business.
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and then after listening to a talking canary in my sleep, imparting words of wisdom about how my parents would never come back because they had been permanently removed as they were frail, a dove actually flew into my bedroom window this morning and remains standing there, stunned.
“Is this all caused by my surrealism?” I hear you ponder.
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Good news (on an unrelated topic):http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/health/mental-health/article3717853.ece
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I also hate it when people say “surreal” to mean “unreal.”
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And imagine how it would sound in Spanish.
She was not even using “surreal.” It was “surrealism”: “The protagonist of the novel hides in her surrealism from the unpleasant reality of life with her husband.”
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
Clarissa's Blog 
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