After Lunch I Outlined My Strategy to Utcoozhoo
Utcoozhoo said, "I hope you enjoyed your Fauci Lasagna."
"Yes, very much, Thanks... What was that extra tangy flavor?"
"You probably mean the blue cheese, but there are five other ones... Well, the chef says it's top secret, ha. So, can you outline your approach to the translation conumdrum? I'm assuming that for now you feel that English speakers will want a verbal and written form."
"Well, um, yes..."
"Tiglekso. Don't worry and proceed as if fog will water the desert."
"OK. Well, the reason I'm starting this way is because the English concept of 'telepathy,' is mostly taboo."
"Yes, from my understanding of the jargon, it's unstable at best, and not at all like yibirmigiv. Uayi?"
"Yes."
After having a thought implanted into my mind, I said aloud, "I see... that's definitely not translatable into a few English words."
"So would you teach yibirmigiv?"
"No, I don't think so. But I'd say, it could be described by a few hundred words well enough as a start, and those words could be named and labeled with a single new word."
"So, how would you describe the existence of yibirmigiv without frightening them?"
"I'd start a new jargon devoid of the present negative connotations.... a sort of benign obfuscation. Maybe something like: A functional daydream that is not a detachment from external communication, but a conscious vision involving two people. An agreement to communicate in a mutual fantasiascape."
"Hmm, yes, I can see why you can't start with that. So where do you begin?"
"Well, before that, let me ask you a question: what would be your thoughts on Bukyg, the telling of history?"
"Hmm, my thoughts in English. That's ironic: English itself doesn't actually have 'thoughts'. But, anyway... There have been many books in English. Each is a distortion of a different kind, a glorified hearsay — the gossip of the conquerors, the elites, the propagandists, ravings of madmen with charisma and minor magic. It is the written word of major and minor egomaniacs, words from scribes of the dominate class driven mad by their self-importance; words from scribes of minorities driven mad by their oppression waiting for their revenge and reversal of role when they will rule and write with a new kind of madness. All of these are the scribbles that blot the world with cycles of boom and bust of ever larger magnitude, notation for melodies symphonic and chaotic, with a tone of hope in overture, an interlude of cacophony, percussion like tornadoes. History of clash. Not enlightening…"
"Well, I'd label that 'Bukyg'. In English maybe that would be explained as the root thought of 'obfuscating and propagandizing', and then parameters would be added in a prefix or suffix. We're starting with a transliterated old-lower Utd'mbts root in Latin alphabet letters which by necessity will be a simplified stand-in, and then I think that as a temporary measure we will use English present participles whose functionality can be more easily recognized by English speakers. It would be a type of pidgin. When you're teaching history, you're actually Bukyg-ing."
"Well," Utcoozhoo said as he struggled to not do the ubemuwx game, "do you have another example?"
"I saw a prologue for a TV show that was a metaphor for obsessions and compulsions that lead to murder, and I was thinking of how an Utd'mbts word is like the name of a TV episode in that it is an underlining concept."
"So you're going about this backwards: you're searching for screen plays and movies in English and trying to match them to Utd'mbts words. Since Utd'mbts already exists, shouldn't you just listen to it and then compose a new 'screen play' to explain it?"
"Well, since you are the central conceit of a fictional drama, that makes for a problem," I said.
"Cogito ergo sum."
"Oh Kievifkwa," I said, "I'm having this conversation with you because no one else will speak to me about this project, and without comment or feedback, I think I will never finish. Actually, logic would say that it is futile. I think that rather than do this, death would be better than humiliation."
"It is true that death approaches. I will miss you. In the meantime, what?" Utcoozhoo demurred.
"Um, well, it's like... you taste blue cheese for the first time. It's delicious and you get a real pleasure high, and whatever anxiety you may have had goes away for a moment as you savor it...."
"Yes?"
"and then, you see packages of it everywhere, in stores, in restaurants, in windows, in salad dressing... and you eat more and more even though you know it's bad for you and you become morbidly obese. But despite the consequences you keep doing it..."
"A compulsion?"
"Yes, the thoughts (obsessions) and the compulsions," I said.
"And so what are the auxiliary parameters. This is not quite a complete concept. Don't you think?"
"Um, yeah, there's more to the screen play. I'm getting to it. It's hard to explain."
"Tiglekso. Go on."
"In the episode, the son of a psychopath can never please his Father who treats him harshly. His father is an anti-government fanatic and he wants his son to follow and espouse radical ideas. Whenever he son says something positive or optimistic he condemns him for being weak."
"Yes, brainwashing children is a common form of abuse. OK, so where does this fit in?"
"Alright, so, here's the auxilary addition to the metaphor, I think: He develops an obsession with using parts from an old devices to build heating elements and he looks for ways to make a timer. He desperately seeks the love of his Father and finally gets some praise by building the elements of a bomb using the timer, and explains to his Father how he can use fertilizer and gasoline as an explosive."
"So it's headed for a compulsion to do violent things to please his father?" guessed Utcoozhoo.
"I guess so. I think I'm getting lost. Maybe it's that a pleasure is found to be objectified as a method for reducing anxiety, and then as a habit or tool, it is used whenever any anxiety is triggered from any source, even unrelated things."
"It's beginning to sound a little like the old Utd'mbts root mykanbu. but..."
"Yes, I know, ubemuwx! But I have to start somewhere..."
"Well," said Utcoozhoo, "identify the two main elements and the various permutations, or should I say perversions?"
"I think I'm going to be sick... this is much too complicated. I think I've barely begun, and this project is dead..."
"Tiglekso. Just contain as much information as you can in the root word or loosely, the story. Then decide what's going to be on the outside, such as the names of the two main characters, or possibly more parameters. Decide on the density of the prefix or suffix words. Begin this process a little at a time."
"Oh hell Kievifkwa,. I think I'm going to vomit."
[CONTINUED]
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