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| Sunset at Camp of the Woods |
On a good afternoon at Camp of the Woods, the adults relax under the beach tent and read while the kids splash in the lake. During this year’s trip, some of my companions were reading mysteries while I pushed through Great Expectations, the *ultimate* beach book.
During this blissful time of reading and edification, my friend’s father looked up from his paperback, an inspirational non-fiction book, and said, “This guy describes his secretary as winsome. Doesn’t that mean whiny? That’s not very flattering.”
The lucky man didn’t know he had a word nerd sitting next to him! “Oh no, that’s a complement!” I exclaimed before I grabbed my phone and started Googling my next vocabulary word. Everyone else shared their definitions of winsome: winning, fairy like, attractive.
Siri and the iPhone offered this: “appealing in appearance or character”.
My friend Elizabeth shook her head. “That doesn’t quite catch it.”
So here is the expanded definition, from Webster’s:
Winsome \’win-sƏm\ adj from Old English wynsum, wynn = joy; generally pleasing and engaging, often because of a childlike charm and innocence; cheerful
I think Elizabeth will like this better.
Word Nerd Workout: Think of someone we all should know- a celebrity, or book or movie character, who is winsome and write a sentence about that person, using the adjective winsome. If that’s too hard, just think of someone you know and write the sentence.
Example: In To Kill a Mockingbird, the winsome Scout Finch captures the hearts of readers with an engaging combination of pluck and naivete.
Your turn! Leave your ideas in the comments below.
Other Word Nerdy words you might like:
portmanteau
obsequious
Julia
I can’t believe Susan used Reese Witherspoon, that was so my pick LOL
Alright, time to think of a new example…
A little inspiration from your sidebar-
Sally Field stole America’s heart as the winsome surfer-girl Gidget!
Great way to use the blog, Laura!
Whenever I get to your word nerd workouts, I always get some sort of sentence-level writer’s block and can never think of something to write. I will say that I love that you put the word roots in with the definition– word roots are so interesting!
I love learning word roots because they help me decipher the meanings of other words too!
I LOVE the word “winsome” and it’s actually part of my vocab. This one is easy:
Reese Witherspoon endeared herself to me with her portrayal Elle Woods, the winsome yet seemingly flighty Harvard Law student.
Thanks, Julia!