Happy & Healthy
WATCH YOUR WORDS
by Maddy Stolk
People didn't even dare to send them to me at first. But as it goes with trivialization, pollution, and overall damnation, it creeps into all your pores and sooner or later you will fall for it. I love language, I love words. One of my great loves is the written word. But my great love is struggling.
It started with a smiley with a happy face and one with a not happy face. Handy when you're in a hurry, although I prefer to say fun, nice, hallelujah! Or shit, bad idea, or – shocker – just no. Then came smileys with all sorts of difficult faces, cycling men in cycling suits, helicopters, an old-fashioned floppy disk, a wild boar, a trombone, a stone head from Easter Island, and a squirrel. Do you hear those developers in Silicon Valley laughing all the way over here? The emoji has completely taken over app traffic. The horror.
The part of me that is already corrupted understands: why would you still want to string together a grammatically correct sentence when you can also send a thumbs up (tonight? I can!), 5 glasses of red wine (drinking drinks, a lot), a flamenco dancer (then dancing), and a sun (until it gets light)?
The worst part is that I've actually started to find some variants fun. There is now a nerd emoji, and I love nerds almost as much as the written word. Nerds are the best. They know things you don't know, are always home when you need them (because socially awkward, they much prefer to sit in front of the computer or with their nose in books to gain more knowledge), and the most important: what you see is what you get. I don't rule out that I might be one myself, although I've been too easily seduced into socially acceptable behavior and watch too much Netflix to still claim exceptional knowledge – one day I'll find my way back. But I'm digressing.
Just so you know. .
There is also an upside-down emoji and it is also part of my active vocabulary, because life is of course completely absurd, and nothing better than turning the world upside down to express that without words.
Yet emoji lingo ultimately creates more confusion than clarity. I was once dating a man who, let's say, belonged to a generation above mine, and he sent such a battery of emojis my way that I first had to consult a friend about what on earth he meant by this. That smiley with heart eyes: what happened to good old ‘I like you’? Nice and easy, because it's not meant to be that serious, hey, just kidding, no, let's indeed never meet again. That's fine – thumbs up, wink-smiley.
Confusion, trivialization: it doesn't have to be, we can still go back. Say it with words. Relationships, friendships, life – it all improves visibly.
I'm telling you.
P.S.: The original emoji was designed around 1998 by Shigetaka Kurita and inspired by Japanese manga and Chinese characters and street signs. Just so you know. Nerd emoji.
