Thank You...

 

Of the many institutions upended by the onslaught of social media, propelled by technology, is the mansion of punctuation. Much hallowed corridors of the house of Punctuation have been taken apart and occasionally differently put together by the social media practices. The outcome is a state of affairs in which many of us, not just the millennial, find ourselves switching allegiances and often enjoying the delights of the new converts, breaking many of the sacrosanct norms of the full stop & comma practices we are drilled into. The weird mix ups of symbols, excess, irrational presence and inexplicable absences too characterize it. But certain of these nouveau norms of non-punctuation are interesting.

The one I really found sensible for reasons perhaps best known only to me is the case of multiple periods. Though Americans call it period, we have never cared much to call a ‘full stop’ a ‘period’. Rather, we have enjoyed the power and absolute sense of finality of the symbol, the 'full stop'. The term effectively brought together finality and closure together, we felt. Whereas the other term 'period' made me think not of limits, but of a stretch of time/space ahead. I have always mixed the term with a school period, a lesson / session duration. It was not a pleasurable mixing anyway.

Now the full stop is kind of disappearing in the torrent of communication, perhaps indicating the feel of the ceaseless flow of the media. This is not to deny that many other art forms related to punctuation too are suffering/enjoying the same status. But something rather endearing has happened in the process. The 'full stop' has released the 'period' inside it. And this is happening through a multiplication of the symbol. Not only are we not stopping the march of a sentence with it, but we are curiously releasing the nonexistent flow of single words with multiple full stops of the same kind.

A 'thank you' just as such doesn't suffice me now really. Though I do send 'thank yous', leaving the words as such without an accompanying set of ...s, is beginning to make me feel incomplete. It is like there is something unspoken. Something abrupt. I feel that if I just key in those two words, it may be interpreted as an impolite act. Like a serious faced, stiff 'thank you'. A 'thanks' which doesn’t thank. An attempt at expression of gratitude which fails to deliver what it means to. It threatens to bounce back. Sometimes there is even the feel that the one who receives it has completely seen through you, your phony act. 

The succession of symbols, the flow of dots, a 'thank you... ', but, is a game changer! It releases the emotion. It seems to open the heart wide. You see the message morphing into a smiley and the happy curve of the lips makes it not a stiff word of gratitude, but a warm take-away of emotion. The dots seem to hint that there is much more to be added, that words don't suffice. That face which is loaded with helplessness and generosity.  

The reckless games the social media played with language and its mechanisms have lead to such interesting reversals too. It may not work in all contexts, in fact it doesn’t. But 'thank yous' are given a period of warmth with a bunch of full stops which are rolled like tiny glass balls, all glitter and twinkle.

It is true that a series of dots traditionally too marked a stretch, of gap in time or space. But our current practice has endeared us to the use of it in contexts where we usually won’t place it. This is not limited to 'thank you' and the dots are raining in many other linguistic locations too. It is equally valid, in that sense, to argue that it denotes a letting loose, a turn to informalisation. But that turn for the informal has endeared one to it when it came to the 'thank you'. 

 It may not be easy for me to go back to a 'thank you' which parades prim and proper, standing tall and steady, with the sense of finality. And that is why putting a 'thank you' at the end of a formal note or an official communication is becoming a task which leaves you uneasy. But I am disciplined to deliver the act, uneasily. But then, certain 'thank yous' certainly don’t deserve the attached show of feel since it is a formal necessity and calls for detached, stand alone 'thank yous'!

A symbol, which in isolation sets limits and when in a bunch expressed release and a stretch, is allowed to indulge in cross border acts of these kinds to my curious delight.

Thank you...