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On the Road Again: Wondrous Words Wednesday


My words for Wondrous Words Wednesday come from On the Road again this week.  And once again when I tried to look up one of words that was new to me, I couldn't find it in the dictionary. Perhaps it was slang back in the day but my hunch is Kerouac created the word to convey exactly what he meant.
To play along visit Kathy at BermudaOnion.net and post words new to you in your reading.

Scrubbled:  "Reopen no old wounds, be as if you had never returned and looked in to me - to see my laboring humilities, my few scrubbled pennies - hungry to grab, quick to deprive, sullen, unloved, mean minded son of my flesh."  
Btw, that's Sal raving on the street, hungry and delirious, after Mary Lou ditches him in San Francisco.
I couldn't find scrubbled in the dictionary but context says they were hard earned, almost as if they were dug up from filthy streets. Any other ideas?

Esculence: "There were seafood places out there where the buns were hot, and the baskets were good enough to eat too; where the menus themselves were soft with foody esculence as though dipped in hot broths and roasted dry and good enough to eat too."
Actually, esculence is not really a word. The word is esculent and it means suitable for use as a food, edible. Kerouac made it into a noun;  I think I am correct in saying that the menus are in fact, soft with foody foodiness!

Ah, that Kerouac. By the way, there's an indie film coming soon based on his book Big Sur, the semi autobiographical story of Kerouac's retreat into alchoholism after On the Road was published.  Josh Lucas, Kate Bosworth star with Jean-Marc Barr as Kerouac. Here's the trailer for the movie's debut at Sundance.  Pretentious or moody and glorious?