I was reading The Gettysburg Address the other day, you know I love history, and suddenly I took particular note of the word score. I thought of its meaning here, 20 years, of course, and then a scroll of definitions unrolled inside my brain. I don’t know why this word came to represent so many different things but check these out:
To score- mark or cut as to score the meat or score the glass before you break it for a clean edge
Score points in a game
Keep score of those points
Score or grade a paper
To score a musical number- write down the notes
A score- the orchestrations of a musical
He scored, as in kissed a girl
“Score!” when you win or succeed and do a high-five because of it
On that score or for that reason
Score drugs
Even the score
I haven’t consulted a dictionary so there may be more, but no wonder English is a confusing language to learn. Hey, wait a minute. Perhaps it’s not so difficult. Since I just covered twelve meanings with one word, it would reason that we have 12% less words to learn after all. Did I do that math right? (I do words. Numbers, not so much...)
