High Praise

I read through Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings trilogy a couple times in my late teens.  For the younger generation who has only seen the movies, you owe it to yourself to discover the incredible way Tolkein crafted his legendary legends.  Tolkein wove everyday words into fantastic adventures.  One of the most vivid images still fixed in my mind is the shrewish Gollum hovering over his ring murmuring, “My Precioussss”.  Eventually, dear little Gollum pays the ultimate price – his life – for the object of his praise.

Oops, I did it again, Precious, Price, Praise.  All related to the IE root per5 meaning to traffic in or to sell.  Today, all these ideas relate to assigning value to something.  When my beloved wife says she does not appreciate my sense of humor, she means she doesn’t find much value in it.  (What’s up with that?)  When you appraise an object, you establish its value or selling price.  Over time, most things lose value - they depreciate.  When you praise something, you are literally celebrating its value by devoting your energy to acknowledging that value.  Gollum sought to possess the precious ring even at the cost of his own life.  That’s about as high praise as you can give!

A related word is interesting.  Preciosity means extreme meticulousness or over-refinement.  Use it in a sentence?  The owner of the antique store had an air of preciosity to him; always fussing over the smallest detail in his collection.

Think about this family of words the next time you go about buying and selling.  Does the price truly reflect the object’s value?