rabbit, raccoon, Algonquin, Teddy Roosevelt, Sagamore Hill, raceme, Xopenex, inflorescence, radio, the wireless

      rabbit (from Middle English) related to ordinary hares but differs from them in producing naked young.

     I never thought of differentiating species by whether their young are covered with hair or fur or not.  Humans distinctively produce very vulnerable babies with a long gestation and a long time of nurturing until independence; I think it is appropriate and symbolic that we are born naked.

raccoon (from Algonquin arahkun)   I include this just because of the Algonquin etymology.  

          There are many other words from the Algonquin language, since this was the first Native American tribe to encounter English explorers on the East Coast.  (The name of my street in St. Louis, Missouri was Algonquin Wood, so I have a special, emotional attachment to this word.)  

     Other words include Mississippi, Michigan, tomahawk, moccasin, moose, the New England quahog, and also Sagamore which meant ‘chief,’ i.e. Teddy Roosevelt’s rustic home and oasis which I visited with my children was Sagamore Hill, appropriately. 

raceme: (Latin racemus bunch of grapes) /raye' seem/  a type of inflorescence (the pattern that flowers and buds grow on stalks).  See the wonderful table on inflorescence in the dictionary…a very poetic group of words.  

         A raceme is an inflorescence in which flowers, on short stalks of the same size, grow from the stalk in equal distances as they approach the apex. 

        In biochemistry, a racemic mixture is composed of equal parts of dextro- and levo- molecules (mirror images).  I use these chemicals almost daily to treat my ADHD and asthmatic patients (xopenex is the levo- form of albuterol, and therefore has less side effects and a longer duration...all because of the mirror image to 'the left').

radio  the etymology comes from ‘radius’ since these electromagnetic waves radiate outwards.  

          The initial application to communication was in the 1881 (Alexander Graham Bell, Hertz) but the term “wireless” was preferred.  

          The term “radio” was adopted in 1907 and became popular in the 1920’s with broadcasting (the Roaring Twenties).  However, Britain clung to the term ‘wireless’ until the 1950’s.  (Interesting that we have come full circle and 'wireless' is the latest craze, i.e. WiFi.)

         My parents, born in 1927, have fond childhood memories of sitting in the living room and listening to the suspenseful radio shows (The Lone Ranger) in the 1930’s and 40’s.