Every so often I remind myself to doubt what I’ve read or seen. Doubt is no snack for casual consumption. It’s what keeps the brain awake when it would rather sleep. A fine thing in itself, when information is slid under the microscope and something gets dissected there.
Then suddenly, out of some ambush in the head, three letters sneak in: MIS. Doubt turns into despair. With one synaptic snap of the fingers, curiosity is gone and the mind no longer understands the world.
Three letters that, as they please, destroy or ennoble. Only grammar has more power than that.
It always feels good to love another living being. But in puberty, falling in love came sliding into my emotional world and for days on end left me not knowing which way was up. That was a strange development, when an overlookable feeling turns into a carousel of soaring heaven and deadly gloomy moods.
Why could I no longer trust my own feeling? It would be so simple if trust came out of it. Where are the three letters MIS when you need them badly? Instead, three question marks get delivered.
The magic of love is still fascinating, but it doesn’t cast its spell as often anymore. The nobility of honest love now has to be ennobled by oneself. That way, the beautiful is more easily embellished.
“I’m into...” whatever. These simple words don’t mean much beyond the appearance of enthusiasm. But when understanding begins, that’s when it gets interesting. Opinions shift or are transformed into new perspectives. The sweet views held so far can, without further ado, be sweetened even more.
So much for the bright side of MIS.
Hold on, there’s more, and above all another side to that very same MIS coin. The whole business of transforming works, if anything, even better on the negative side.
Want to take a guess which terms these are? Suddenly, from guessing comes betrayal. Damn it. Now would be the time for a bit of loud cursing. Am I right? Oh, cursing someone out is even stronger? Yes, as long as it’s not me, trudging through the world as the cursed one.
Then I’d rather pick a trait that has to do with leading. What’s that, did I misdial?
When leading turns into misleading, that counts as a misdeed.
The verdict doesn’t take long to arrive: condemned, banished, disowned. For the victims, distress remains.
For the misleaders, contempt.
Whoever is responsible for a prefix like MIS probably had no idea about the mix-ups and mis-steps it would cause.
Or so I misguess, at least.
