A Word to the Wise: On Being Awesome

It started as a meeting of two friends looking to share a common background.  It morphed into a competition of words. I’m amazed at what a deli can do. You’ve heard of the apple of discord that sparked the Trojan War. What made us clash was pastrami. They say the devil is in the details. So is the truth.   Josh and I planned to meet for coffee at a café on Park Avenue South to talk shop. He had finished his degree in theology at Cambridge University. Since mine from Harvard was in comparative religion, we spoke of our get-together as Cambridge meeting Cambridge. We agreed on the day and time: Sunday at 1 PM. But New York is not keen on the status quo; it’s more like the fluxus quo. Anything can happen and usually does. Josh phoned me at noon to make a last minute change:

“A friend from King’s College is staying with me for the weekend. Before Joel flies back to London he’s made a final request. He’s asked me to join him at the Carnegie Deli. He heard the restaurant is the most famous deli in the United States. He wants to eat there before leaving New York.”

“Fine, Josh. When can I expect you?”

“Around 2 PM.  After the deli he’s going to MOMA to see the Kandinsky’s. I’ll be coming alone.”

True to his word, he arrived on time and sat with me at a corner table. We asked for two cappuccinos. I was about to order biscotti when he said:

“Nothing for me.  I had my dessert. A huge slice of cheese cake. It was the sandwich that did me in. I’m stuffed. The restaurant’s motto is pinned to the wall: ‘We did something wrong if you finished your meal.’”

“And did you?”

“Yes. It was a challenge. I’ve never eaten a sandwich that big. It had at least a pound of meat. It was awesome pastrami.”

I winced at the word while Josh noticed my reaction.

“You too?” I asked. “The word is everywhere.”

“What word?”

“Josh, you can’t call pastrami awesome.”

“Why not?”

“You’re guilty of bathos: an abrupt transition from the exalted to the commonplace. The effect is ludicrous. I’d like to say you used the word deliberately, but I think the humor was unintended. In combining the very high with the very low, you’ve succeeded in being funny. At Cambridge, I’m sure you were told literature is the appropriate use of language. As a literary man, you have every reason both to speak and write appropriately.”

“The sandwich contained a pound of meat. Doesn’t that qualify as awesome?”

“As someone who majored in theology, a stuffed pastrami sandwich doesn’t meet the requirements.”

“Of what?”

“Of awe. I’ll concede the sheer girth of the pastrami was astonishing. You may even have felt a sense of wonder as you bit into eight inches of smoked beef. But you were being indulged, not awed. Awe is a feeling that combines reverence, admiration, even fear. It’s produced by what’s sublime and extremely powerful. Some people are in awe of God or Nirvana. Others stand in awe of great beauty or genius. They feel it when hearing the works of Bach or observing the power of a tsunami; the Great Pyramid of Giza or the vastness of cosmic space. They’re startled by what lies beyond the narrow band of consciousness. But not by pastrami.”

“Okay. You’ve made your point. But why get so impassioned by a word?”

“Because I’m trying to reclaim it as supremely important. When a truly awesome event befalls you like the birth of your first child, and the nurse hands you the infant to be cradled in your arms while your wife looks on exultantly, you’ll have no word later on to recount your profound emotion. Misuse will have made ‘awesome’ powerless. Thus impoverished, you’ll be speechless. We’ll never know the impact you felt.”

“Your precision leaves me very little wiggle room.  For an American, you’re downright undemocratic.”

“On the contrary, I was trying to be spacious by widening the multiple choice. Why muddle through with jargon or a cheapened vocabulary? English is the richest of languages. You can dedicate your life to mastering it and die without doing so. Don’t pick up the Americanized attitude of ‘anything goes.’ Americans are often viewed as petulant teenagers with an appetite for aggression and vulgar language. You can hear it on the street in conversation. Everywhere, the F word has replaced ‘very’. For now, I limit myself to awesome.”

“The problem is usage. I never hear anything like your definition of awe. It doesn’t exist.”

“You’re wrong. The word, in its strict sense, is still critical. Holding on to it can even ensure prodigious sales.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“At this year’s Naples Wine Festival, a select few tasted banner vintages from Bordeaux’s renowned Chateau Haut-Brion. The owner, Prince Robert of Luxembourg, was not nervous. This was no ordinary tasting: the vintages were from historic years. Haut-Brion has a storied history dating back to the 16th century. Its red wine was a favorite of Thomas Jefferson. Fawned over by critics, a case of Haut-Brion ’61 recently auctioned for five figures.

“As the prince unveiled the wines for an audience of forty, they said he ‘seemed slightly in awe.’ ‘It’s exceptional,’ he said.  ‘Being in front of these bottles is like being in front of the Grand Canyon.’ Prince Robert meant the comparison judging from his hushed tone. As he put it after the tasting, ‘Truly awesome.  I’m absolutely speechless.’”