practice makes perfect

Word Etymology

After I named a category 'Practicing out in the Boonies', I thought, hey, this is shortened slang for another slang term "boondocks". But where in the world did that word come from? I went to the bookmark for one of my favorite sites: Merriam-Webster Online. It is free and gives you a great interface for both a dictionary and thesaurus. I was in for a big surprise on this word's origins. Merriam-Webster shows the etymology as:
Etymology: Tagalog bundok mountain
1 : rough country filled with dense brush
2 : a rural area : STICKS

Well, the first thing I asked myself was, what language is 'Tagalog'?
Tagalog - Pronunciation: t&-'gä-"log, means
1 : a member of a people of central Luzon
2 : an Austronesian language of the Tagalog people -- compare PILIPINO

Central Luzon? Austronesian? My mind is on the wrong continent now - If the meaning is mountain, I picture a Swiss Alpine scene and someone saying "Bundok!" But that reference to 'Pilipino" and the 'nesian' on the end of 'Austro' starts my mind awandering elsewhere in the world:

Again from Merriam-Webster:
Etymology: Austronesia, islands of the southern Pacific
: of, relating to, or constituting a family of languages spoken in the area extending from Madagascar eastward through the Malay Peninsula and Archipelago to Hawaii and Easter Island and including practically all the native languages of the Pacific islands with the exception of the Australian and Papuan languages

In middle English and in Norse, the term 'sticks' is applied to mountainous areas of dense brush and woods. This is a synonym for 'boondocks'. I am always fascinated at the number of unusual words we use with a precise vision of their meaning in our mind, but no consciousness of where they came from.

A few weeks ago, my husband and I watched one of the less covered 'sports' on ESPN - the national spelling bee finals. In fact, we enjoyed it so much, we tuned in when it was repeated several days later to see the part we missed. (Don't worry, we do get out once in a while, too.) We were very impressed with these 12 - 15 year olds standing under hot lights, spelling impossible words. They methodically asked questions of origins, meanings, pronunciations, and usage examples to derive the correct spellings in their mind - no paper or pencil allowed.

Perhaps their gift for understanding Latin, Greek, and other language forms will help them in medical school one day!

Healthcare Access in the Country

When I was a toddler, I had asthma attacks fairly often. At least several times, I know my parents raced me over country roads to the doctor's office some 15 miles away for a shot of adrenalin. At that time, before the advent of the federal interstate highway system, living 30 miles from Philadelphia was considered the "exurbs" - beyond the suburbs, a catchy new name for rural communities outside large metropolitan areas.

When I-95 came plowing through, however, some small villages and the adjacent farmland became hubs of growing populations from housing developments, with widened roads and shopping strip sprawl. Others went by the wayside, becoming nothing more than crossroads with names only known by locals whose families had lived here for generations. Newcomers wondered why roads took 90 degree turns. (Originally, to respect each farms boundaries)

Even now though, living smack-dab in the middle of the northeast corridor, somewhere between Philadelphia, Allentown, and Princeton, I travel on and over some of the last dirt roads and stream fords left in this area of the country. When I need to go grocery shopping, or to the doctor or hospital, I still travel 1/2 an hour to get there. To me, this is a small price to pay for peace and tranquility, but it sure is inconvenient when you don't feel well and need to fill a prescription.

There certainly are far more remote areas in much less populated areas of this country where people travel much further than I to get medical attention. I've often wondered whether doctors that practice in these remote areas do so because it has always been their home, or if they have made a choice to do so because, for some reason, they were attracted to a lifestyle much different than their up-bringing.