Wordle & Zhuzh

This summer, every morning fairly early, around 7 a.m. my time, I look forward to receiving the text, "Guys did you do Wordle yet?" 

The text is not from my sisters or from a friend. It is not from my husband. It is from our 8-year-old grand who group texts her Nana and me. She early-morning dabbles in the word game and asks us for hints. She has us wrapped around her little finger when it comes to hint-giving (it helps that my time zone is one hour ahead with the wake-time advantage).  

"She sees words, and that is what matters" I say to myself and the hubs as I justify any hints given to her. 

We help her. Then, after we have all solved the day's challenge, if the word is fun or unfamiliar, we try to think of creative ways to use ethos, chart, party, beget, etc. in a sentence. On a side note, I don't think the five-letter word zhuzh will ever be used in Wordle because of its unusual letters and difficulty.

We hope that one day the "aha" moment will come for our grand. With patience and time, and if her Wordle interest continues, I hope a light will turn on and words will come alive. I hope that "first love" and learning and understanding will intersect... when her mind is primed and ready.

That is my hope as we walk through defining the meaning of Zhuzhment Day. To progress toward understanding, with the prize being an "aha" moment and maybe even a eureka, too. 

Deep Dive

The word zhuzh is not in my copy of the 1978 The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary. A few people believe it is a Yiddish word. "Some swear the term is Romani in origin, derived from the word 'zhouzho' meaning clean or neat" (languagehat.com).

I ran into oddly spelled and odd-looking zhuzh on Thesaurus.com, searching for a word with a similar meaning to renew. I needed to hear its pronunciation... "zhooz"... for the light to turn on. That word is familiar, and inspiring, as well. To renew, or to zhuzh, embellish or clean.

A poignant scene from Top Gun Maverick comes to mind pertaining to understanding. Pete Mitchell (Tom Cruise) stands outside of the Top Gun bar (Hard Deck) he was thrown out of moments ago. He hears the song "Great Balls of Fire" being played on the piano by a fellow pilot, his Godson Rooster. It stuns him like deja-vu because Rooster's deceased father Goose played that same song on the piano over 30 years ago. I thought that was the stinging connection for Pete and why the look on his faced showed he reminisced the song, with painful memories. 

But after thinking more about that scene (EQ-impaired, I re-watch movies a zillion times), a new and deeper meaning hit. The actual lyrics "great balls of fire" were like a premonition. They rang true in Pete's mind and memory and hit him strongly. Thirty years previous, his co-pilot and close friend Goose (Rooster's father), died in the plane Pete was piloting when it exploded in great balls of fire. That was the actual why for Pete's stinging reaction. A deeper meaning of that familiar song was better grasped, because he felt one of many dimensions of Godson Rooster's present-day anger towards him.

Like it took forever to "get" the real reason for Pete's reaction to the song in the bar, it takes a deep dive to understand Zhuzhment Day. One hint: My figurative windows were cleaned, and eyes were opened to the light, on Zhuzhment Day. Eureka!