Epergesis (e-per-gee’-sis): Interposing an apposition, often in order to clarify what has just been stated.
My Oder brother, “Edward the fish,” has numerous problems. The biggest is his tendency purse his lips like a fish mouth. Then, he makes a gurgling sound when he gets nervous. Sometime he says: “Look at me, I’m an anxious sunfish.” He also has a very unfortunate self abuse tendency: he will hook himself with a Red Devil fishing lure. We don’t know where he gets them, but somehow he does. His lower lip is always loaded with scabs. When he hooks himself my mother has to get the hook out. She cuts it with a pair of wire cutters for minimal lip damage. Of course, Edward was awarded “The Fish” nickname due to his fish-fixation. We tried for years to figure out where his fish fixation comes from. We determined that it probably started when he went fishing with our father when he was a little boy.
They got up early, around 5.30 am and headed for nearby Lake Stone. Dad had given Edward a child fishing rod with a push-button reel shaped like Donald Duck. It was about 2 feet long. This was Edward’s first-ever fishing trip. He had no idea what to expect and Dad, in typical Dad fashion, didn’t bother to fill him in.
There was an abundance of fish that year—mostly sunfish. Dad and Edward filled our rowboat with Sunfish that day. Poor Edward was pretty much buried under bleeding, stinking sunfish. He tried to jump out of the boat, but Dad hit him on the head with an oar, and told him to quit whining and stand up if he didn’t want to sit with the fish.
When they got home, Edward smelled like a ripe tuna. Dad had dumped the fish on the lakeshore because it was “a pain in the ass to clean them.” Right away Edward started acting like a fish. Some day, we hope to relieve him of his problem. Soon, he’ll be able to collect welfare because he’s crazy. I don’t think they’ll find anything fishy.
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
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