The religious community to which I belonged for thirty years is the Discalced Carmelites. Discalced is the seldom-used English version of a Spanish word meaning barefoot or un-shod, referring to the fact that that particular group did not wear shoes or boots with its habit but wore sandals. The name of the Order in Latin is Ordo Carmelitarum Discalceatorum, thus giving rise to the abbreviation, OCD. Discalced Carmelites write those initials after their names, the way Jesuits add the letters SJ, meaning the Society of Jesus, or academics might write PhD.
The other reference to OCD [or ocd] concerns obsessive-compulsive disorder, which is (according to Wikipedia) an anxiety disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts that produce uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry; by repetitive behaviors aimed at reducing the associated anxiety; or by a combination of such obsessions and compulsions. Symptoms of the disorder include excessive washing or cleaning; repeated checking; extreme hoarding; preoccupation with certain kinds of thoughts; relationship-related obsessions; aversion to particular numbers; and nervous rituals, such as opening and closing a door a certain number of times before entering or leaving a room. I note that lots of us do some of these things, but that doesn't mean we suffer from clinical obsessive-compulsive disorder. Some of us are just reflective and careful about how we do things, right?
So in the earlier post, I was playing with the fact that I used to be an OCD [Discalced Carmelite] and still am a bit ocd [obsessive-compulsive] when it comes to things like writing.
Or explaining myself.
Like this post, for example.
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