“Now I Know the Meaning of ‘Faklempt’”

  I just had the shortest drive back from having dinner with my son and his family in Winchester. That’s because I heard the acceptance speeches of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris during the drive, and the time just flew. But it was the content and intensity, the fervor and the sincerity that touched me. As “they” say, I was faklempt! I never really felt what that word implies. Klempt means “clamped” (similar sound); better yet, you’re all choked up with emotion; tears well up; it’s hard to speak; as the Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore song lyric describes, “my bosom swells with pride.” That’s how I knew the meaning of faklempt because that’s how I felt listening to them.

  Their words are giving me hope; indeed, the realization that unity may – and I stress “may” – yet flower underscores where we are and where we can and should proceed as a nation and as Americans. Hearing – and knowing in my heart -  that major steps will be taken to defeat COVID-19, to confront climate change, to accept the word of science and not virtual charlatans, to clean up the environment, to restore good will with our global allies, to confront the world’s other autocrats who have taken advantage of us while we’ve ignored their attacks against us, to show compassion, to stand up for justice, and on and on and on, made me faklempt as I heard these two LEADERS and VISIONARIES speak from their hearts and souls.

  I was faklempt in my pride for being a Delawarean. Delaware? Or “Dela-WHERE?” as I said when I knew I would be living there. A President of the United States from Delaware?? We thought we were big shots having a Vice President! Do I know Joe? (“Listen to him! What chutzpah!! He’s calling the President-elect ‘Joe’”) I’d be fibbing if I said I knew him well, but I did write about my ironic connection to Joe Biden in one of my My (Daily) Word! columns in March.

I’m faklempt, and whether my parents would approve of my use of Yiddish (which they would not), I’d still shout out, “I’m faklempt! I’m faklempt! I’m faklempt!...and I think they’d say they were faklempt too!