Prunudle
#1 The road is never straight, but always move ahead toward the unknown destination
#2 You never really know until you get there”
#3 There are no rules
Gotcha
Years ago, Twana Sparks and I invented the Prunundle. We did not know what we were doing. Gas was 25 cents a gallon. West Texas was flat. Lubbock was boring. Perfect conditions for the development of the Prunundle.
While most people of our age drove up and down the drag, that seemed uninteresting to us. We were two bright young people who liked to think and to talk about what we were thinking. There is no better place to do that than to drive out into the fields of the Caprock for hours on end.
One of our most interesting conversations centered around whether, if the universe and all things in it is constantly expanding and contracting, one can measure the expansion and contraction. I’m sure, now, you can see why it was just the two of us.
As we began our drive one evening, it occurred to us that we needed to have a description for what we were doing. “Going for a drive” did not measure up to the enormity of our experience. We decided to base our name on the basic elements essential to the experience which we identified in the center console of the vehicle, the gear shift lever.
The name stuck with us. We grew up and went our separate ways, checking in every now and then. I had kids and Prunundled with them, taking side roads just to see what was there or just getting in the car to drive, destination unknown.
As they grew up, they understood and used the term themselves. I learned that one of them hated Prunundles, especially when we were on our way to somewhere else. Of course, she also hates the way I drive in general and will likely be the one who takes away my keys. But the other two loved them most of the time.
At some point in their twenties or thirties each of them came to me with a story and a question. The story was typically about an experience with a friend in which they prunundled. The questions typically began with “And I told them this was a prunundle and they didn’t know what that was. Is prunundle really a word?”
And my answer each time was, “Of course it’s a word. I made it up with Twana, and now it’s your word, too! That’s how words are made.”
What’s your word? Hmmm?