Word Obsession

And speaking of words that catch my imagination, sometimes I get obsessed with a particular word. For some reason it sticks in my brain and won't go away. It fascinates me, and soon I have to do something about it--make a story or a poem, read a book about it, say it so many times I get sick of it. Right now the word is "puppet." Why? I have no idea. I think it may have started with an episode of InuYasha that involved demon puppetry, and the phrase stuck. Or maybe it wasn't that at all. I've always been fascinated by puppets. My grandfather used to have an old suitcase full of hand puppets, and a rack of marionettes hanging in the basement, many of which he'd made himself. I was especially enamoured of the skeleton marionette. I still am. That's one cool puppet. And kind of creepy, too, which is even better. I think Granddad might still have a few of those puppets, but I don't know if the skeleton is among them. Perhaps I should ask.

The weird thing about word obsession is that, if it's a good word, I don't even want to make it go away. "Puppet," I think to myself. "How cool. Puppetry. Puppets." Just say it out loud. That repetition of "p" sounds is fascinating, isn't it? Or maybe I'm just weird. I wonder if there's a good online tutorial on puppet-making. I could make a marionette to photograph for my NSCAD portfolio (I'm supposed to be devoting this week to getting that done). That way I could exorcise the puppet obsession and not feel like I was wasting time. Then again, "puppet" is such a fun word to have stuck in your head. Or in mine, anyway.