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School Days and Preschool Days, Too:
A treasury of anecdotes culled from my work and play as a preschool worker and an elementary school after- school activities supervisor
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 WORD SLEUTHS

       At snack one afternoon in the Elementary Aftercare program I mentioned to a 4th grade girl named Anita that I thought the new salsa we were trying with our crackers tasted sort of weird.     
      "You shouldn't use that word!" Anita said, an expression of shock on her face.
     "What word?" I asked her, puzzled.
     "Weird," she said, still wide-eyed. "Do you know what it means?"      
     "I think so," I told her. "If you bring me a dictionary, though, we can check it out together."
     Anita left and returned a little while later with a thick Children's Dictionary. We opened the book and leafed through to the Ws. The only definition given for "weird" was "pertaining to the supernatural."
      I flipped back to the front of the dictionary and found the date of publication opposite its title page. The volume had come out in 1970.
      "This is an old dictionary," I said. "Sometimes people start to use a word in a new way and old dictionaries get outdated. It's how we talk that's the important thing."
      "Yes," she said matter-of-factly. "But to use a word in a new way, you have to get one of those little slips of paper from the government."
      "Little slips of paper from the government?" I repeated, having no idea at all what she was talking about. "This is the United States of America! People here don't have to get permission from the government to use a word the way they want."
      "Oh, never mind," said Anita, feeling that she'd been made wrong and climbing inside herself.
      She was still standing nearby a little while later, though, when Ms. Clea, the school librarian, happened by. By including the librarian, I found a way to re-open our conversation.
      "Ms. Clea, this young lady thinks you have to get a slip of paper from the government to use a word in a new way," I made my appeal. "Do you have any idea what she's referring to?"      
      Ms. Clea stopped, a bemused expression on her face. "Are you talking about getting a copyright certificate?" she asked thoughtfully.
      "No, not copyright," replied Anita. The three of us stood there in thought until a light slowly came over the librarian's face a moment later.
      "Poetic license!" she said, smiling broadly as she shared her revelation.      
      "That's it!" said Anita, her own face beaming with satisfaction. Ms. Clea and I explained to her that you don't actually need a Poetic License, the way you need a Fishing License or a Driver's License. We two adults were relieved and amused, and Anita felt understood. We had solved the linguistic mystery.

                                        
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