Signifying

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Life is a tale, told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

“The appeal of the house for Americans, going back into the 20th century, was that it signified autonomy. You know, every home is a castle,” says Louis Hyman, an economic historian and assistant professor at Cornell University. “So, it has these echoes of signifying independence and achievement.”

On the 10th of March of 2015, it is a walking day to a doctor's appointment. In the morning, I visit the local Roman Catholic worship centre. It is a brown mid-20th-century building. I gaze at a Mexican Santa María painting in the hallway. There are words in Spanish. The banners in the high-ceiling main chamber are purple, signifying support for Lojban and things Lojbanic, perhaps. By lunchtime, I am at the Richmond Public Market. I take the stairs up. First, I drink a plastic glass full of Sour Plum Bubble Iced Green Tea from a bubble tea vendor called Peanuts. Second, from the food vendor Captain Wa at a corner, I eat Noodles with Lemon Chicken, Tofu, Lotus Root Slices, as well as complimentary Hot Tea. Third, I drink a Starfruit Bubble Iced Green Tea from Peanuts, again. Fourth, having taken the escalator down, I buy a strange sinographic dictionary of a strange Asian Mainland tonal language. Fifth, having gone up the escalator, I drink a Mint Iced Tea from a bubble tea vendor called QQ Bubble Tea & Coffee. (The Q maybe is support for my Xoqolat.) The cold mint drink reminds me of my drinking mint at a café in Versailles in France, years ago. The Richmond Public Market is like a big garden atrium, as if in the middle of a tropical jungle. It is full of Kanjifolk.

Vling is my Orange Dream Conlang. As the word endings in Esperanto express parts of speech, the tones of words in Vling express parts of speech. A word generator with a randomizer created the Eastern-ambiance vocabulary within seconds. Interestingly, the word "faig2" with the "2" signifying mid-level tone, as a noun, means "river," mystically alluding to the Buddhist idea of an "ever-changing stream of consciousness" instead of a "soul."

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

For the sake of convenience, we may call these pointings or signifyings the secondary phase of meaning.