Posted on 11.26.08 to Supporting Roles by Ben Cheney

Did your dog jump off a cliff?

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Supporting roles are often overshadowed and even looked down upon. But let’s jump in my time machine and I will introduce you to a supporting role that doesn’t suck: the adjective.

We’re going back to the 7th grade. A time when bodies were developing, emotions were bubbling, and sentences were being diagrammed. I had a freshly trimmed bowl cut, an awkward overbite, and a killer pair of JNCOs. Life was too weird in almost every way.

There I am, sitting in English class, arguably one of the worst classes I have ever been forced to sit through. My teacher, Mrs. Pendleton, is a large woman with a small head and beakish nose. She is writing something on a blackboard that is almost white with chalk dust; apparently it hasn’t been cleaned in months. But that doesn’t matter, I can’t concentrate on what she’s writing anyways. Instead I am mesmerized by the back and forth rhythm of her dangling upper-arm skin. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. And then I hear it. Flap. Flap. Flap. I’m entranced by dangling, old lady arm skin. Gross.

I jolt to my senses right before drool spills over my open lips. I shake it off and look at the blackboard, consciously avoiding the flappy skin. Mrs. Pendleton is explaining adjectives and their role in the formation of sentences. I never liked Mrs. Pendleton, and I don’t think I ever learned much from her. But for some reason, her lesson on adjectives stuck in my mind.

That day I learned that adjectives play the greatest supporting role in the English language, yet we do not appreciate them. We throw adjectives around like rag dolls without a home, even though they are what bring sentences to life. Adjectives add color and emotion, and without them many sentences are just plain boring.

Example:
“I have a dog.”
“I have a dead dog.”

Which one is more interesting? The second one of course. The adjective adds intrigue and breeds many questions. Why do you own a dead dog? Isn’t that illegal? How did your dog die? Do you store your dog in a jar or the freezer?

Without adjectives sentences are nothing but a lifeless group of words. Adjectives make sentences and stories and books and plays worth reading. Adjectives make the English language worthwhile.