SCRABBLE - The Last Word Newsletter

T H E N E R V O U S R A C Kthat should be allowed, and that very soon (when the SCRABBLE dictionary committee comes upwith its new list in 2014) will be allowed, but that now are verboten. (By the way, verboten is anacceptable SCRABBLE word.) Marty is very sensitive to intruder words; he’s afraid they will maketheir way into his brain like worms from some science fiction movie and nestle there, perhapsmating with the acceptable words.I was about to say something like “A lot of women like to get bling for their birthdays, but I don’t needbling. I’m not a bling kind of woman” when Marty paused and looked me tenderly and said, “Let’stalk about you. It’s your birthday.”“Good timing,” I mumbled, but Marty didn’t know what I was talking about.Another annoying incident occurred on Saturday at SCRABBLE Club. We have a tradition ofcelebrating monthly birthdays; we have cake and a prize for the highest scoring word played thatday that includes the initials of the birthday person. For example, someone might submit DeMentedfor Daiva Markelis. Sometimes we have prizes for the word that best describes the personality of thebirthday girl or guy; the birthday person is the judge. I was not happy with last year’s selection;people entered words such as slut, grump, grumpy, and, inexplicably— dogears. Luckily, my friendMary Maddox submitted ritzy, which won hands down.It is Marty’s job as Mr. Director to read the words out loud slowly.He came to the word cagey and looked at me for a long time and then uttered, “Daiva is a cageyLithuanian.”“Cagey is not going to win,” I announced.“How about enabler? Daiva is an enabler to her students.”“Nope.”I was getting exasperated with his examples and thought I’d start making up words and repeatingthem over and over. Words like wordworm.“Wordworm is an acceptable word, isn’t it?” I was about to ask. “It’s kind of like wormwood, right?Wordworm, wormwood—what’s the difference?”But then Marty looked at me and uttered the word young.“My Daiva is always young,” he said and smiled and put his arm around me.All thoughts of wordworm left my being. 71