Misshapen

Reading is really good for you, but there are bad consequences if you read a lot. 

"That makes no sense!" is probably what you are thinking right now. But let me tell you, it does. So this little mishap happened just yesterday to me. It all started with a zombie 5K that I ran with my friend Kayleen and her sister Kerrisa. 

This run was so fun! There were zombies scaring us and running us off the path and there were a bunch of obstacles that we had to get through. We all really enjoyed it. Afterward I was telling David, my husband, about all the obstacles that were on the course.

 Note: Being the avid reader I am, I have a fairly large vocabulary. Most of it comes from reading books and seeing the words over and over in context. Sometimes I can even use words in the right context and not know what they mean, so I have to check with David because he has a larger vocabulary than me.

 I started to describe an obstacle that had a huge pile of overturned tires strewn all over the place that we had to climb over. This place was just asking for a sprained ankle. The word I used to describe the tires was "misshapen". David heard me and asked, "what did you just say?" to which I replied "they were misshapen." This probably makes sense to the readers, but the way I pronounced the word was mis-happen. It seemed logical. They use that word in books all the time. David responded "I think you mean misshapen (pronounced mis-shapen)." We went back and forth for a while arguing our own points when he burst out laughing. He said, "you are talking about the word spelled m-i-s-s-h-a-p-e-n right?" and then it dawned on me. We were talking about the same word. Of course I had heard the word misshapen before, but every time I encountered it in a book I pronounced it wrong in my head. I thought they were two totally different words! 

The worst part? This isn't the first time this has happened to me. Once he pointed out that we were talking about the same word I remembered a couple years ago when I came across the word "perused" in a couple of books. I read it as per-yused with a y sound in the middle. The first time I didn't think much of it. It was just a word I didn't know. The second time I thought, "really? Perused again? How has this come up twice and I don't know what it means?" but once again, I left it and moved on. It was the third time I read "perused" in a book that it finally dawned on me. PERUSED!! I had been reading it wrong! I know that word! It means to skim over, or to lightly read through. So silly.

Now I am wondering how many other words are there that I know but  pronounce wrong in my head?