Like plants and animals, language evolves over time. It can be seen in three dimensions. One involves the creation of words. Another the attempt to transfer ideas from one brain to another (I'd say 'person' but your dog would object). A third involves the transfer of emotional content from one heart to another. It is often ignored but this third dimension is really important to your dog. So it should be really important to you too. It will really improve your relationship.

Thomas Jefferson enjoyed studying the origin and development of words. If he was alive he would be very interested in how his words are being used. What did liberty mean to him in1776? Was it different from the common understanding then? Now? What's so important about liberty? The same question could be asked about other key words in the declaration; independence, democracy, truth. Respect. Independence on the face of it meant freedom from the rule of England. Declaration was equally important for the author, or he would have named the paper something else. Wait, what? Did you say RESPECT? Where is that? First sentence. The declaration was made out of respect to the opinions of mankind. In context, respect to the King of England... . <long pause> "Well I declare."

What happened to the word freedom? Somebody, at some point decided it meant they were free to have a closet full of guns. Somebody else preferred their closet to be free of cowering gun-shy lovers. Some actually fancied their liberated closets with both features... there's nothing wrong with that, more room for the guns in fact. The normal somebodies get their friends to use freedom as meant, and there you have it... the 2021 version of the word "freedom." Bare arms or bear arms... take your pick. Unless you're in multi-party Abbey Normal's house, you've got your freedom...sometimes. See... you might lose it from time to time but then... that's your choice. We hope. Now, depending on which road you've taken, or which bucket you were born into, either your father is really proud of you, or you've had to find your pride elsewhere. Each road has its stones. Sometimes they get picked up and thrown at the other roads and some don't.

John Dewey understood words also, and he was very concerned about democracy. "Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous." I'm not certain I understand his words, but I do my best. I think the gist here is... "Democracy make us human." In a moment of greater clarity he penned, "in addition to voting rights, a democracy requires communication among citizens, experts and politicians." I get that one. I'm thinking these communications he's suggesting involve more than brief hand gestures. Perhaps he means conversations. I don't mean to imply that congressmen - that we - don't really talk to each other. Talking to another person is pretty much like talking to your dog though. The exact meaning of words might not match up all the time. A mask used to be something you wore on Halloween or Abbey's house. Snowflakes fell on eyelashes and mittens. When you're all snuggled in front of the tube on Sunday and you suddenly scream at a running back "GO OUTSIDE! Run! Run!" your dog might get hopeful and think, "well, it's about time and I'm glad you feel as strongly as I do, now how about opening the door... I could actually use a little alone time." Things get lost in translation. Have you ever been in a relationship? Multiply that 6 billion times.

If I said, "meioses," you might not recognize a word I use, or think about cells dividing. I wouldn't recognize it either - I just saw it in the rhetoric section. Once I complained to friend that nobody was listening to me. After a very, very long pause, he turned and said he was listening and liked everything he heard. About the other 'nobodies', he said "What goes around comes around." I was confused... but more conversation confirmed that we had very different understandings of that phrase. We discovered that as it got whispered down the lane ( from the hood in late 80's Philadelphia, to the suburbia of 20s Corpus Christi) it went from, "gossip is like a boomerang" to "they'll catch on eventually." Maybe there were always 2 meanings. Or maybe I'm better than he is and he's an idiot. Maybe there is a word for the elites that know something more about words and phrases than I do. It's possible. Jefferson would know. A few years ago, in my world, elite was spelled l33t and meant you could hack into your neighbor's WIFI in seconds. It was a good thing then (among hackers). The word elite might still have a chance to land in the good bucket if we could just have a conversation about it. Elite strike force? Don't want to lose that one do ya? C'mon, we can do this.

You might recognize a word, say..."blue" or "red" ( everybody's ears perk up) but when it comes to to it, your picture of blue might be different from mine. Your blue might be my red-ish. But if the king says "my blue is The Blue"... well, so be it. We have different brains. A more believable example might be "hot." Some people perceive Asians as hot and fatties not. Vise a versa. Some blonds, some brunettes. You can take this analogy as far as your ethics are willing. Although, for me, preferring Asians is simply unthinkable (while I'm writing). Piece? Might bring to mind a sidearm. Or a butt if your thing is guns and not sex. Gun? You've got your pistol people and your submachine gun people. If you're actually talking by some chance, you might COMPLETELY misunderstand that Piece really meant calm, relaxed, and quiet. Something like that could get super funny or super weird. Depending on the matrix of possibilities.

When you've got liberty, you don't have a King telling you what to think or how to behave. "My Kingdom is not of this world." If you insist on the earth King thing, well... God gives a long argument about this being a bad idea in the Old Testament. Most of the collection is about it actually. We should freshen up. Or not, the Democracy of Jefferson is not for everyone. Alternatives can be found - It's been done before. "We have no king but Caesar." Sound familiar? Sometimes I just want to go outside and run, run, run.

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