I Think It’s Beautiful

“You’re weird,” she said to me.

I wasn’t offended. It’s one more reason I love her, she is willing to be my wife even though I’m weird.

Granted, “weird” before marriage may be novel; while weird after marriage may not. I realize she has a limit to how much weirdness she can tolerate in a day or week, but all in all she’s a pretty good gal.

We were sitting in the sunroom. Watching the morning light play with the trees, watching the birds, enjoying the early-morning quiet. My mind wandered from the surrounding beauty and contemplated another beauty; I was visualizing it, meditating on it, swishing it around in my thoughts the way you might enjoy a swish of fine Cabernet. The flavors were having a party in my head. It was like a jeweler with a loop enjoying a radiant gem.

She asked, “What are you thinking?”

“Do you really want to know? You won’t believe it.”

“Tell me.”

“Are you sure? You won’t believe it.”

“Just tell me.”

“Okay. I was thinking how beautiful a semicolon is.”

“What?”

“I was thinking how beautiful a semicolon is.”

“You’re weird. Why would you think that?”

“When I was doing a blog post this morning, I used a semicolon in a particular place and it struck me as beautiful. I originally had a comma and a conjunction, but then I realized a semicolon would be just right. With a semicolon you don’t have to come to a full stop, a period; you need not use a comma which can move things too fast; it cuts down on conjunctions which can be tedious. The pause which a semicolon provides can be just enough of a pause to ponder; just enough of a rest before you move on – it need not interrupt the music and rhythm of thought, the dance, the point and counterpoint. The semicolon is beautiful.

“You’re weird.”

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