Why “delirament” is a great word
DELIRAMENT — [Noun] A wandering of the mind; a crazy or delirious fancy. From Latin dēlīrāmentum, from dēlīrāre ("to be deranged, to rave"), itself from dē- ("away from") + līra ("furrow"), thus literally "to go off the furrow, to deviate from a straight line". First attested in English c1450. Unlike "delirium," which suggests a fevered, systemic state, or "whim," which implies a capricious but sound fancy, a delirament is a solitary aberration, a private madness. It is the conviction that the wallpaper’s paisley is a secret code, the certainty that one’s shadow has begun to lag a half-second behind, or the serene belief that one can hear the grass growing—each a furrow abandoned for the trackless field, a ploughed line leading only into brambles, where every thought is a lonely, blooming weed.