Pal, Pall, Palls

Have you heard about pen-pal? Pen-pal is the friend you have found by writing letters to and fro but in digital age?

“Women are not pals enough with men, so we must make ourselves indispensable. After all, we have the greatest weapon in our hands by just being women.” –Maria Callas

Many of his pals attended when he was carried by the pall-bearers to the cemetery paling his persona non-gratas or enemies.

Pal is an informal reference to a friend, companion, mate, buddy, comrade, chum, homeboy, cobber (Australia & New Zealand), fellow (watch out pal, you could be in trouble).

Some people have many pals (plural noun of pal).

When you pal up (verb) with someone it means you are getting along with him or her, becoming friends.

Couples could also become very pally with each other.

Pally is an adjective. If you are a pally person, it means you are friendly person.

Palish is an adjective. If you are palish, it means you are pale.

Pall functions as a noun and verb.

Pall as a noun has two distinct meanings: pall refers to a cloud, shadow, veil, mantle, shroud; and another meaning of pall is a state of gloom, dismay, melancholy, and damper.

Pall is the cloth spread over a coffin or dead body.

Figuratively, pall refers to a dark or heavy covering: a pall of gloom spread over the house.

A pall of smog has become a recurring feature of many towns and cities of the Indian subcontinent.

Pall as a verb refers to something boring, dull; become tedious or tiresome or wearisome, cloy, jaded.When you experience something too much or too often it could pal, it could become boring.

The family left their holiday destination in a resort as their stay started to pal with overindulgence in dining and swimming without doing anything.

The variants of the verb pall are palls, palled, palling.

“English speakers dread silence. We are all familiar with the uncomfortable feeling that overcomes us when a conversation palls.

Studies have shown that when a pause reaches four seconds, one or more of the conversationalists will invariably blurt something – a famous comment on the weather, a startled cry of ‘Gosh, is that the time?’ – rather than let the silence extend to a fifth.” Mother Tongue: The Story of the English Language by Bill Bryson

How many pall-bearers will be there for you when you have had left the world?

Pallbearer is the person who walks beside the coffin in a funeral, or carries the coffin.

By: Kovuuri G Reddy