Words won't save us, but florps might

Gavin Doonley had no business being in a spelling bee, which is precisely why he entered it.

It was a Wednesday at the National Regional Inner-State Semi-Final Spelling Bee, when Gavin began his slow, ceremonious march to the podium. He walked as if summoned by destiny itself, though in truth, he had merely checked the wrong box on a community sign-up form.

“Your word is chrysanthemum” said Mrs. Gribble, the head judge, who had once mistakenly married a filing cabinet and stayed in it out of sheer principle.

Gavin blinked. He had heard of chrysanthemums, certainly. He’d even bought one once thinking it was lettuce, but had never seen the word spelled.

He took a breath.

“C…R…”

There was a long pause.

"I'd like to challenge the word on the grounds that it is exclusionary" he said suddenly. “I believe that the word ‘chrysanthemum’ should be replaced for reasons of inclusivity, with the far more accessible and user-friendly alternative. Florp.”

There was silence.

“Florps are for everyone” he added helpfully.

Now this would have been a one-time absurdity had it not worked. But it did work. Mrs. Gribble, stunned in a sort of bureaucratic paralysis, had no choice but to move onto the next contestant.

Emboldened, Gavin survived Round Two by replacing “pharaoh” with “fancy desert man.”

In Round Three, he renamed “onomatopoeia” as “boomword.”

By Round Five, he was simply giving definitions and asking if that was enough. “A long Italian noodle. We all know what I mean. Do I need to spell it?”

Mrs. Gribble nodded mechanically, clutching her beloved copy of “Meditations—On Proper Protocols.”

And so it went. By the end of the spelling bee, Gavin had replaced 42% of the English language with what he dubbed as emotionally intuitive sound clusters. He won, narrowly defeating a 12 year old who could spell “archaeopteryx” but failed to define “florp.”

With his winnings, Gavin opened a florp shop, where he sold bluzzles, snorts, grimbs, and twees (or for those who prefer bluebells, daffodils, geraniums, and tulips). He even had roobloops, zooplurps, and kooshoos (otherwise known as rhubarb, zephyr, and quiche). But it closed shortly after opening, owing to a strict store policy of refusing credit cards, cash, or any form of payment that involved even the faintest whiff of math.

Affixed to the door was a handwritten note that read, “Gone Florping.” Gavin was entirely untroubled by this development. The purpose of the shop had never truly been commerce or foot traffic. Rather, an endearing excuse to surround himself with a universe of words that made perfect sense to no one but him.