Figurative Balls

Before we get too far into this thing, I thought I'd define a term that will come up an awful lot in our writing about things-- "figurative balls."

The term "figurative balls" grew out of a few things in the world of me and Sarah. The first, I suppose, would be the grammatical. We are both distracted by the gross over- and mis-use of the word "literal." It's so often used just for emphasis. I suppose this probably grew out of the word "really"-- because "real" and "literal" both stem from the same area of definition. Well, maybe not-- most people just don't analyze themselves that much. They just suck at grammar. In our world of Pancakes and Duct Tape, we make distinctions between "literal" and "figurative" that most of the world does not.

Other than the grammatical pickiness of "figurative," the term stemmed from the compulsive need to make lists of attractive qualities in men. We have lists describing real men we've known, lists of fictional men, and lists of traits our ideal men ideally possess. Figurative balls is just an emphasized trait on the last of those lists (and on the lists of the better fictional men we love. I don't guarantee that any men we've actually known possess figurative balls). So, then, when making an overall ideal list on our whiteboard, we realized that just using the phrase "has balls" could be taken in a relatively literal way (the argument there being that "balls" is not the anatomically correct term) or a figurative way (courageous, "ballsy," prone to stick up for oneself). On our extensive, group-created-on-a-white-board list, both "figurative balls" and "literal balls" appeared as qualities we require in a man.

EXAMPLES:

This week on Glee, Emma grew some figurative balls and told off Will for being an ass.

Rick Castle and Shawn Spencer do not seem to be able to muster up any figurative balls to tell Beckett and Juliet (respectively) how they really feel. Of course, Beckett doesn't seem to have those figurative balls, either. Juliet already used hers at the end of An Evening with Mr. Yang.

After Alex was killed, and, later, when he was tricked into killing Jacob by Smoke Monster As Locke, Ben Linus seems to have lost a good deal of his figurative balls. I hope he gets some back before the show ends.

Robert Chase grows figurative balls as House progresses. I'm damn proud of him for killing a tyrant and losing his wife by standing up for his actions. He's gotten more attractive as the show goes on-- partially due to better hair, and largely due to his figurative balls.

I like to think that I have figurative balls. At least I do in some situations. I'm an alpha female.

Back to my ideal man list-- I need a man with figurative balls to challenge me and not let me (figuratively) walk all over him. Because if he lets me, I will. It's just who I am.

-A.