Paregmenon (pa-reg’-men-on): A general term for the repetition of a word or its cognates in a short sentence. Often, but not always, polyptoton.
Movin’ and groovin’, groovin’ and movin’ makin’ my way to Saturday night—night fever had me in its groovy grip. The Bee Gees were blaring and I was bustin’ moves in front of my full-length mirror, making the floor shake in my funky old apartment by the railroad tracks in a tiny town in south Minnesota. By day, I wore a hairnet and worked in the Thor Knudsen High School Cafeteria. On Saturday Nights, I wore a black leather jacket, black platform shoes, black slacks, a black belt with my initials as a buckle, a black ruffled shirt unbuttoned to my belly button, with gold neck gear around my neck, featuring a Peruvian Coke spoon the size of a soup spoon, a peace sign medallion and a gold-placed Matchbook toy ambulance. My life was devoted to the dance, and, eventually, to Ruby, my partner.
Nobody wanted Ruby as a dance partner. She only had one leg, and those oafs couldn’t see past that. Her leg had been amputated below the knee, so she still had considerable mobility with her prosthetic leg. She had lost her leg in a car accident. She and her boyfriend were riding along singing “Blueberry Hill.” When they got to “I found my thrill . . .” Ruby squeezed her boyfriend’s crotch and he ran into a bridge abutment at 70MPH, killing him instantly. Ruby became despondent, taking responsibility for Tommy’s death. She would do crazy things, like drinking beer out of her prosthetic leg. That’s where I met her. She was drunk and she was taking a drink from her leg. I knew her story and my heart went out to her. I said “Come on baby, let’s get you home.” She swung her leg at me and hit me in the face. My nose started bleeding and she started crying and apologizing. She put her leg back on and we left. We dated and she seemed to be calming down. Then, the disco craze hit.
It hit me hard. I was obsessed, addicted, a prisoner of the beat. Initially, I left Ruby behind. After all, she only had one leg. But when I saw her face when I was practicing in the mirror, my heart broke. We had to figure out a way to get her on the dance floor. We practiced in the apartment, surprisingly fast, she got the moves—the leg-thing meant nothing with the exception of one dance move we developed together. I would pick her up and take off her leg and set her on the floor—she would rock back and forth to the beat of the music, watching me, while I would hold up her leg and wave it around like a lasso over my head. Then, she would lay on her back and I’d pop her leg back on and pull her up, continuing to dance. Not everybody liked the move, and that was a shame.
Anyway, Ruby and I outlasted the Disco craze. We are married and have a daughter. I was promoted to lunchroom cashier and eventually started a franchise of all you can eat buffets called “Tubby’s Trough.”
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
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