Kvelling in Words

I am a word lover. A logophile. I like the way certain words sound on the ear and taste in the mouth. I like seeing them on a page and rearranging them to make new meanings or clarifications. I like the challenge of analyzing grammatical intricacies. (I tried explaining this to my 15-year-old son last night when I was looking over his English homework. He wasn't convinced that how words work together in sentence patterns was at all beguiling.)

My English-teacher parents nourished this love of words by giving me each Christmas a Word-a-Day calendar. You know the kind—you rip the pages off every day to reveal a new word. (I still get one at Christmas, only now it's from my husband.)

Often the words are somewhat lackluster. (Witness quail, belfry, and enjoin which come later this year. [I peek ahead sometimes. But that's another post.]) But yesterday's was one I'd not heard before: kvell \'kvel\ v: to be extraordinarily proud; to rejoice; from the Yiddish kveln, meaning "to  be delighted." And that word kvelled my heart.