Saturday, September 20, 2014

Picking at words

I walked to the bank today. It's open until 2 o'clock on Saturday. As I waited for a teller, I looked at one of the windows--it's not really a window; I suppose at one time it might have been more of a window; these days it's just the place the teller stands behind to help the customer, who stands in front of the "window."

It was closed, but the small name plate said,               Jane
                                                                           Head Teller

If you didn't know what it meant, you might think Jane had something to do with heads, like feeling the bumps on them, heads, and foretelling a person's future. Or maybe like just telling people they have heads.

That's not what it means.

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In a recent poem I wrote this phrase: some high-minded idea we have come up with.

So today I got to wondering where we get that phrase, come up with. What exactly does it mean? Do you know?

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