Antagonize - when explaining a definition gets under your skin

Everyone has those words that they both love and hate at the same time. The words that they understand, can use in a sentence, spell, and tell you off for using wrong, but ask them to define it and they look at you like a deer in the headlights.

The word was “antagonize”, and this is my story (I promise you there is a point to this, and the italics are just a little bit of me sharing what was running through my mind.):

It was the start of September, and I was happy to be going to the ESL Center’s fall picnic. I got there and I saw a TON of international students, and I was ecstatic! (In general, I love meeting new people, so when the email with the open invite to the picnic came across, I was thrilled at the chance to meet some of the ESL folks.) Since it was mostly for ESL students and faculty, people were a bit surprised to see what appeared to be a relatively young-ish fluent speaker of English. I was asked several times (at least 5) if I’m a teacher, and after saying no, I was then asked if I’m someone’s kid. After explaining the whole thing about being TESL/TEFL (Teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language), I was regarded with a bit less suspicion. At one point, I was even asked what country I’m from because I sound “like I’m from the north”. (This brings to mind the Dr Who episode where Rose asks the Doctor why he has a northern accent if he’s an alien, to which he replies “lots of planets have a north”. On a separate but semi-related note, the TARDIS can translate nearly any language and put it automatically into your head. Neat, eh?) Anyway, time passes, people are talking and eating, and everything’s going well. We start talking about families a bit, it must have been families, and I mentioned something about my brother and I liking to antagonize each other. The other American at my table, an ESL instructor, said that I needed to explain what “antagonize” means. “Ok”, I thought, “here goes nothing”: and that’s exactly what happened: despite knowing the word through and through, it completely escaped me. Skipping over the immense struggle of trying to find the words I wanted, I finally was able to put that word into simpler English. To sum it up: I can’t get my words right if I have to change my words. 

After all that, what kind of person would I be if I left out the true meaning of the word and all that fun stuff? Antagonize is defined as a verb with the meaning “to incur the dislike of; provoke hostility or enmity in; or to counteract (definition from American Heritage Dictionary 5^th Edition).

So, I guess I could say that trying to define “antagonize” antagonized me to the point that I felt the need to share this entire story with you. Best of luck with your own words, and see you in the next entry!

(513 words)