Vote for the best verboticism.
DEFINITION: n. The sacrifice a mother makes when she gives everything to her children, including life itself, and then simply lets them go. v. To give someone everything and then watch them walk away.
Verboticisms
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You have two votes. Click on the words to read the details, then vote your favorite.
Lifeprovisionist
Created by: guesser
Pronunciation: Life + pro + vision + ist
Sentence: Her journey consisted of being a lifeprovisonist , a choice she would make out of the love in her heart.
Etymology:
Chilflessness
Created by: Rhyme79
Pronunciation: chill-fuh-less-ness
Sentence: "My neighbour displayed such chilflessness when her son left the nest, it was quite moving."
Etymology: An amalgam of the words 'child' and 'selflessness'.
Albotify
Created by: blinkinglight
Pronunciation: Al-Bo-Tee-Fuy
Sentence: I haven't fully understood the hidden message in the commercial, could you please albotify?
Etymology:
Sacribyes
Created by: Nosila
Pronunciation: sak rib ize
Sentence: After her tenth child was born, Melba knew it was time to start giving her sacribyes to the older kids. Not that she wanted to, but they were 19, 20 AND 21 and needed to get out in the world to make their own way. Besides, she would still have 7 at home under age for now to look after. Her biggest worry was what would she do when this last little one left the nest...because she had given up all her identity to raise him and his siblings.How much of her own self was there left?
Etymology: Sacrifice (endure the loss of;the act of losing or surrendering something) & Byes (a farewell remark;) and rhymes with Sacrifice
Kidtropia
Created by: ldikarev
Pronunciation: kid-tro-pia
Sentence: As summer went on she felt kidtropia looking at her garden from the wheelchair. True feeling of kidtropia enveloped him as he watched his spaceship leap into the unknown time and space.
Etymology: kid, kids. - atrophia (in this case 'self' is atrophied in order to make room for needs of the child)
Sacremancipate
Created by: Nosila
Pronunciation: sak remans ee payt
Sentence: She had done all she could for Little Robin... gave him life, fed him, cleaned him, taught him about life and kept him warm. It was now the time to sacremancipate him. His educatgion would continue at a higher level. Now that he knew where to look for the choicest worms, how to avoid predators and how to sing to attract a mate, Mother Nature would continue his education and teach him how to migrate each fall and return each spring. It was very sad each year when they left the nest to make it on their own.
Etymology: Sacrifice (the act of losing or surrendering something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform etc.) & Emancipate (liberate, free from slavery or servitude)
Materiavitae
Created by: mishmish
Pronunciation:
Sentence:
Etymology: Well, it's all Latin. It means "material of life", and it also starts with the sounds of the Latin word for mother (Mater).
Matrifice
Created by: eiggy
Pronunciation: 'matt-ri-fice (ri-fice as in sacrifice)
Sentence: Mrs. Jones raised Bobby on the best cereal, laundry detergent, and education money can buy. She spent every waking moment making his life meaningful. What matrifice!
Etymology: matri - from Latin mater 'mother' and fice - from facere 'make'
Divorfeit
Created by: iwasatripwire
Pronunciation: di-vor-fit
Sentence: My poor mother had a hard time letting me go to college so far away, but eventually she came to terms with her divorfeit
Etymology: divorce (in the separation sense, not the end-of-a-marriage sense) + forfeit
Matridoricide
Created by: cohenarie
Pronunciation:
Sentence:
Etymology: latin words for mother, gift and murder
Comments:
Today's definition was inspired by Cory Doctorow's novel Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town, which is a story about a guy who's mother is literally a washing machine. It's a great read! And since this weekend is Mother's Day, it seems like the perfect fit! I was also thinking about "After the Siege" in Overclocked, where a mother pushes herself beyond exhaustion trying to save her child - the sacrifice. And purpleartichokes inadvertently suggested the mother idea with her comments on the younger degeneration. Thank you Cory and purpleartichokes! ~ James
ErWenn - 2007-05-11: 09:39:00
I noticed that many verbotomists focussed on the "letting go" part of the definition as the key, while others treated it as just one small part of the maternal sacrifice. I'm sure it says something about our personalities, but I'm not sure what.
We have posted The Petaj Splinterview on the Verbotomy Blog. ~ James
Bulletchewer - 2007-05-11: 16:55:00
I "have issues" because I advocate free speech as opposed to miserable hypocrisy of censorship? HUSH
Hey Bulletchewer, I replaced four letters in your message with non-alphanumeric symbols. Did that make you unhappy? ~ James
Hey ErWenn, I agree with you. The words and language we choose to use do indeed reflect our personalities. And with a definition like today's, there are many different viewpoints, so it gets complicated... I guess that's why they have Freudian psychiatrists. ~ James
Bulletchewer - 2007-05-11: 19:18:00
It made me THE most $@*#ing miserable crybaby in the whole world! Just kidding.
Me too. But that's okay, it's a game ~ James
Anyways, in many parts of the world, this Sunday is Mother's Day, so I would like to remind all our verbotomists to take appropriate action (e.g. buy flowers). And to all our verbotomists who happen to be mothers, I would like to say thank you. Thank you for your wonderful creativity. ~ James
*gasp* I am so honored. Petaj used my word TWICE!!! in his splinterview. Now, I can die peacefully.
Clayton - 2007-05-12: 17:21:00
Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that the highest scoring words often do not reflect the part of speech suggested by the definition? Occasionally, this can be somewhat difficult to determine from a given description, but "the sacrifice a mother makes" clearly indicates that this word is meant to be a noun. Just nitpicking.
Hey Clayton, I have made a blog posting about this question. See: Parts of Speech and Verbotomy. It will be very interesting to hear what ErWenn has to say about this issue, since he also asked similar questions. ~ James
Clearly I should have mentioned that ohwtepph can also be relied on for coming up with not only amusing words, but very useful additions to everyday language.
Today's definition was suggested by doctorow. Thank you doctorow. ~ James