The old Y!360 used to have a Word Thursday. I even hosted that weekly event for some months. I found it quite informative as it always sent me searching for a new word or seeking the exact definition for a word I thought I knew and certainly used enough.
Today on Facebook I was suddenly overcome with an intense need for privacy. Yes, I know that Facebook privacy is an oxymoron (I will let you go look that one up). But despite the fact that I post four blogs, have a website for my business, a studio open to the public, and have an active Facebook account I am really a very private person. I don't attend high school reunions or trod the old college campas or go tripping through the Internet looking for old friends. This is now and that was then.
Nor am I on all these social networks for the sake of finding new friends especially. I have met some great new people admittedly but I trust slowly. And I find that my friends are almost as private as I am. Today I made a comment on comment on the FB page of a more public friend of mine and was ambushed by one of her friends. I immediately deleted my comment (not because I am wrong but because I was afraid of catching something - cooties maybe) and dashed back to my settings and cranked everything down to friends only so the friend of a friend could not follow me back to my lair.
So my word today is private.
pri⋅vate
–adjective
1.
belonging to some particular person: private property.
2.
pertaining to or affecting a particular person or a small group of persons; individual; personal: for your private satisfaction.
3.
confined to or intended only for the persons immediately concerned; confidential: a private meeting.
4.
personal and not publicly expressed: one's private feelings.
5.
not holding public office or employment: private citizens.
6.
not of an official or public character: private life.
7.
removed from or out of public view or knowledge; secret: private papers.
8.
not open or accessible to the general public: a private beach.
9.
undertaken individually or personally: private research.
10.
without the presence of others; alone.
11.
solitary; secluded.
12.
preferring privacy; retiring: a very private person.
13.
intimate; most personal: private behavior.
14.
of, having, or receiving special hospital facilities, privileges, and services, esp. a room of one's own and liberal visiting hours: a private room; a private patient.
15.
of lowest military rank.
16.
of, pertaining to, or coming from nongovernmental sources: private funding.
–noun
17.
a soldier of one of the three lowest enlisted ranks.
in private, not publicly; secretly: The hearing will be conducted in private.
Origin: 1350–1400; ME < class="ital-inline">prīvātus private, lit., taken away (from public affairs), special use of ptp. of prīvāre to rob. See deprive, -ate1
