Occhiolism

Cover image for the Occhiolism word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Occhiolism

n.
the awareness of how fundamentally limited your senses are—noticing how little of your field of vision is ever in focus, how few colors you’re able to see, how few sounds you’re able to hear, and how intrusively your brain fills in the blanks with its own cartoonish extrapolations—which makes you wish you could experience the whole of reality instead of only evercatching a tiny glimpse of it, to just once step back from the keyhole and finally open the door.

Italian occhiolino (“little eye”), the original name that Galileo gave to the microscope in 1609. Pronounced “oh-kyoh-liz-uhm.”

Nementia

Cover image for the Nementia word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Ellipsism

a hand clawing at a wall

Ghough

Cover image for the Ghough word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Watashiato

Cover image for the Watashiato word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Innity

a neatly made bed with diffused light glowing

Amentalio

a person in a white dress, facing away