From “stinky head” to the architecture of memory: why words matter

Recently, Esther Kustanowitz, a journalist and educator I admire, and I had a robust discussion about words — how the choices we make in using them shape not only the stories we tell, but the reality we see.

I come by my love of language honestly. My mom was a writer, and vocabulary in our home was sacred. When I was six, I called my dad something like “a stinky poo-poo head.” My mom told me she would handle the punishment.

The next day, she handed me a list of twenty-five words — synonyms, essentially, for “stinky poo-poo head.” Boorish. Tyrannical. Crude. Mean. Vile. Rude. And so on. I had to copy each one twenty-five times.

“Next time you’re angry,” she said, “use these words instead. I didn’t raise a daughter to speak in the lowest common denominator.”

That lesson stuck.

Years later, in tenth grade, I had a teacher — Mrs. Hersh — who made us memorize one hundred words a week. These weren’t your standard SAT words — they were the kind that lived in dusty, leather-bound dictionaries: ancillary, avuncular, deluge, mercurial, rapacious. And THOSE were the easy ones.

Every Friday morning we had a quiz, and every Wednesday and Thursday night I’d stay up late muttering those words on a loop — (including some of the ones my mother had made me write as punishment years earlier because I resented the assignment)

But now I know these two women — my mother and Mrs. Hersh — had conspired to make language my inheritance.

And to this day, I’m grateful. They demanded precision, but also imagination. They made me understand that words aren’t just tools — they’re architecture. They shape the way we think, the way we feel, the way we tell the truth.

Sometimes — let’s be real — I don’t draw on that vocabulary.

Sometimes I’ll throw in something less than savory — because a little grit is essential. And besides, they say people who swear are more honest, so there’s that.

But because words have shaped my life, I can’t stand it when others — especially journalists — use them carelessly, or worse, manipulatively.

That’s why I find some of The New York Times’ reporting despicable. Yes, they’re covering hostages, and I appreciate that. But when, in the same breath, they refer to human beings as “leverage,” I feel my mother’s voice again: choose better words.

So here’s one worth remembering:

Hamas is not a “militant organization.”

The correct word — the precise word — is terrorist.

Hamas is a terrorist organization.

Please memorize that, friends.
Write it down 25 times if you need to.

Language isn’t decoration. It’s definition. And if we care about truth, we have to call things what they are.

Words are the first draft of history — and I refuse to let ours be written in lies.