Word obsessed: Psycho Vocabulary Girl

A few weeks ago I found out I needed to take the GRE. I’d like to enroll in a doctoral program studying Spanish linguistics and start classes next fall. Part of the application process is of course the GRE, essentially the SAT for graduate students. Since it covers math and English language skills that supposedly we all studied in school I didn’t think it would be that big of a deal. Then I looked through the review materials and became instantly depressed. I never realized how poor my vocabulary was until I read through some of the analogies and didn’t know a single word! First I cried. Next I got really angry. Then I became vocabulary obsessed.

Maybe I was just in the mood for a challenge, maybe I don’t like feeling not so smart anymore, or maybe I just didn’t like being told that it was impossible to learn that many words in so short a time. In short, I became determined to conquer this. My smarter friends assure me the exam is not based in reality and I shouldn’t worry so much about where I am right now. Still, I’m relearning as many Latin and Greek roots as I can and I carry flashcards with me everywhere I go. I really have become psycho vocabulary girl but I don’t care. The dictionary in my head needed a major joust and it got one, a very long one that fills my dreams with strange dialogs. I’ve learned about a thousand words over the past few weeks and I have two and a half weeks to go before the exam. A thesaurus is in my car for stoplights and I buy stacks of index cards every time I go to the store. I think it’s become a problem but it will be over soon.

I actually have started noticing some of the words showing up in real life. It’s amazing how many GRE words are in the John Adams miniseries. My husband and I have been watching the DVDs but I think Joshua is getting tired of me squeezing him every time I hear one of my vocabulary words spoken by Adams, Jefferson or Franklin. It’s just fun to actually hear them in context since the only other time I note any of them being used is by my Wines of the World professor. Honestly, most of the words haven’t made it into my everyday speech because they just sound a bit too stuffy for now. Still, some vocabulary like “legerdemain”, “curmudgeon” or “hinterland” is just too fun not to say.

Oh, and I’m still looking for a math tutor…