Exacerbate

As an English major, I love words.  I love the way they've evolved, I love their meanings, spelling, and the way the sound.  I love learning new words and using them on unsuspecting non-English majors.  But, along with loving words, there are some words in the English language I detest.  They are the unpalatable words that leave my mouth twisted around their syllables as I struggle to spit them out (often incorrectly).  They are also the words that look dirty.  When read, I feel the same way as one must feel as an undesirable man with lustful intentions examines them from head to toe.  They are also the words that are overused in texts-- particularly by the same author-- to the point where they completely lose their meaning.  Today's hated word of the day?  Exacerbate.  

Not to be confused with 'exasperate*,' exacerbate (pronounces ig-zas-er-beyt or ek-sas-er-beyt) means, according to Dictionary.com,  

1.	to increase the severity, bitterness, or violence of (disease, ill feeling, etc.); aggravate.

2.	to embitter the feelings of (a person); irritate; exasperate.

So, why do I hate 'exacerbate' so much?  I just finished Girls Like Us and my one complaint about the book is that the word exacerbate is used excessively.  About the third time I saw it, I was exacerbated by the author's lack of vocabulary for the word "irritated."  (HA!)  And, at about 1:00 a.m., it's not a very easy word to spit out.  Despite hearing it said many times, I could not spit it out for myself.  I tried saying it over and over with different emphases and inflections until I reread the sentence in my head with 'exasperated' instead-- at least I can say that.  And, when I finally did pronounce it correctly, it was one of those icky, dirty words that left my mouth tasting like black licorice.  

It's no wonder that words like this aren't taught in public schools.  It's the kind of word that produces worried (and perhaps slightly illiterate?) mothers as their children come home and say,  "Mom, today we learned the word 'exacerbat(e/ing/ed)!"  

And, yes, I realize that I just rambled on about the word 'exacerbate' being exacerbating.  

*Go ahead and mix them up.  I don't think anyone will ever notice nor care.'

On a happier note, I'm listening to Joni Mitchell's lovely, melancholia inducing music (and remaining very happy), and reading The Tempest.