This morning Sammy said “jam is spelled J-A-M!” I told him that he was right and asked how he knew, since no jam jar was in sight. He shrugged his shoulders and returned to his Fruity Fables.

I contemplated how my 4 year old just knew how to spell “jam”, then it occured to me that his name is Sam, and he knows how to spell it. He probably figured out that he could replace the “s” with the “j” and turn Sam into Jam. How proud I was!

Aidan piped up: “Sam and jam rhyme! And so does lamb!”

Then she noted the big difference, much to my surprise, “but the ‘b’ in ‘lamb’ is forced to stay quiet because ‘m’ is a bully…”

“M is a bully?” I asked, rather disappointed that M is so mean.

“Yes, M is a bully when it won’t let B talk,” she said.

Why is M a bully? Was it raised without good parental guidance? Does it have self-esteem issues? Dr. Phil says “hurt people hurt people” There must be much mourning in M’s past. Much malevolence. Many months of mean mothering. Mucho mischief.

And what makes B a target of M’s harrassment? I don’t like blaming the victim, but does the poor fellow play with Barbie? Does his bulbous backside have anything to do with M forcing B into bondage? Poor B cannot speak when the words numb and dumb are uttered–how ironic.

Aidan continued, “And some letters are unfair to others. Like T-I-O-N should be S-H-U-N.”

How dare the letters T-I-O-N gang up together to keep “shun” down, under their thumbs (which, in turn, allows another bullying opportunity for M)! On their own, they are such nice, sweet letters. But get them together and they rule the world! They rig elections! They take endless vacations! They throw splashy celebrations of their power! They incite revolution! They ought to know that when grouped together, they should sound like “tee-eye-on”. But they don’t care. It is a violation of common sense. Maybe if S-H-U-N showed a little gumption, they wouldn’t be in this woeful situation.

The next thing I will hear about is how I comes before E, except after C! Does C have some dirt on I? All C has to do is show up on the scene, and I receives grief. For C to prefer E is her business, I suppose. What I find odd, however, is that when faced with science, C backs off and allows I to get closer. Dr. Phil would chastize C and command consistency.

Who invented this language, anyway?

Originally posted on November 30th, 2004. Reposting inspired by frustrating attempts to explain spelling rules to Sam, now a second-grader.