An ode to punctuation.

To tell you the truth I was a little torn on how I could title this blog. After all labels make a difference right? I remember writing composition and essays in school based on pre-chosen topics. Not all of them were to my liking; but then again neither was the whole experience of being in school. The only reason kids really 'like' (no this is not the Facebook 'like') is for almost all other reasons except for the very seemingly obvious reason- to study. But I digress- which was in fact one of my challenges in writing an essay- I invariably digressed. 

So back to labels and how I could have titled this blog: Periods, commas, and exclamations? Or "the mark of a punctuation?" Maybe it doesn't really matter as long as my message gets through. What message you might ask? 

I'm glad you asked. I want to answer this by sharing with you one of my recent tutoring experiences. I was tutoring a young girl and doing my best to drill into her the fundamentals of the English Language. A fairly daunting task actually because the English language contains almost as many exceptions to the rule as there are rules. One of the areas we covered was that of punctuation marks; when we use a comma, or why we need to use a semi-colon, and so on. 

As always being the overly contemplative person that I am, I tried to extend this metaphor of 'punctuation marks' to life, and to the situations we face everyday. If we had to describe a certain situation, or even a person that we found challenging- what kind of punctuation mark would we use? A comma? A full-stop? An exclamation mark? Or a hyphen? To me a comma represents a pause, like taking a breather. We encounter a situation that we find trying and sometimes we need to insert a comma somewhere in the midst of it. To pause and just breathe. A full-stop could mean that we're done with one phase of life and we're ready to move on into another. An exclamation mark shouts success! at accomplishing something that we may not have thought possible before. And perhaps a hyphen means we're undergoing transition. 

These are all just my opinions of course. To someone else the very same punctuation marks could very well mean something entirely different and opposite even. Honestly it doesn't matter. What does matter is how we choose to punctuate our life everyday; with question marks or exclamation marks? We decide how we write and punctuate the composition of our life. 

Esther @ www.soakupinfo.com/Esther