SABBATICAL NOTES. 14 JAN 2014 N3. AND THERE SHALL BE 'HOUSEBAND.'

SABBATICAL NOTES. 14 JAN 2014 N3. AND THERE SHALL BE 'HOUSEBAND.' 

THE LAST TIME I checked the Internet's Free Dictionary, I got the following from the lexical entry, 'husband.' 

I checked that precisely because I wanted to understand why is it that that dictionary has failed to reflect critically--help, help critical hermeneuts of the Amianan world!--my condition of not being ONLY a husband, but 'houseband' as well.

I checked 'houseband,' that social pathology I am in presently, and it is not there, and except for these inexact clues below, I was not helped at all.

Well, I saw two renditions of 'houseband': one a band, the other, written in two words, also a band, making all those cacophonous, metallic, tungsten-sounding music my Ilokano eardrums cannot stand. Not a sec.

So here we go, from that Free Dictionary entry:

hus·band (hzbnd)
n.
1. A man joined to a another person in marriage; a male spouse.
2. Chiefly British A manager or steward, as of a household.
3. Archaic A prudent, thrifty manager.
tr.v. hus·band·ed, hus·band·ing, hus·bands
1. To use sparingly or economically; conserve: husband one's energy.
2. Archaic To find a husband for.
[Middle English huseband, from Old English hsbnda, from Old Norse hsbndi : hs, house + bndi, bandi, householder, present participle of ba, to dwell; see bheu- in Indo-European roots.]

And then, of course, the history of that word, copied verbatim from the same source.

Word History: The English word husband, even though it is a basic kinship term, is not a native English word. It comes ultimately from the Old Norse word hsbndi, meaning "master of a house," which was borrowed into Old English as hsbnda. The second element in hsbndi, bndi, means "a man who has land and stock" and comes from the Old Norse verb ba, meaning "to live, dwell, have a household." The master of the house was usually a spouse as well, of course, and it would seem that the main modern sense of husband arises from this overlap. When the Norsemen settled in Anglo-Saxon England, they would often take Anglo-Saxon women as their wives; it was then natural to refer to the husband using the Norse word for the concept, and to refer to the wife with her Anglo-Saxon (Old English) designation, wf, "woman, wife" (Modern English wife). Interestingly, Old English did have a feminine word related to Old Norse hsbndi that meant "mistress of a house," namely, hsbonde. Had this word survived into Modern English, it would have sounded identical to husbandsurely leading to ambiguities.

My social pathological condition is that I am--and I have correctly diagnosed myself--a houseband, not only a husband (and father thrice over!--but a husband plus.

A husband plus is not a husband alone, but a husband that: (a) husbands his home, and (b) husbands his family.

And yes, it is both a NOUN and a VERB.

With correct Ilokano affixation, possibly one that goes all around with those magical Ilokano prefixes, infixes, and suffixes, or a combination of two or three of those, we can turn that into an ADJECTIVE too!

So, this is a call for all those husbands staying home, and husbanding their family and home: Let us rise to the occasion, and declare that from hereon, in that Free Dictionary--are you listening lexicographers?--there shall be another word for this social pathology, and we shall call this 'houseband'.

WPH, HI/14 Jan 2014