I always assumed that Wow! was an expression dating from the late, lamented hippie days because it sounds wide-eyed and stoned in the best possible way--the very opposite of a blasé “whatever.” I started wondering about the origin, though, and discovered that the first recorded use of the word was as an exclamation in a 1513 translation into Middle Scots of Virgil’s Aeneid. A very old and literate Wow! Since I read that, I’ve been regretting taking the name of Wow! in vain and using it as a kind of all-purpose conversation filler. When I was very little, I lived in a near-permanent state of Wow!. I was convinced there was a storybook land beyond the line of trees at the back of the field behind my grandparents’ house. I believed that fairytales were real, and the paperdoll families I created had rich inner lives in their houses with shoulder-pad armchairs and tables made of thread spools.

I know it’s inevitable to get a little jaded as adult, but when did I start taking it all for granted?

The monarchs swooping through my yard on their amazing migration, maple syrup from generous trees poured on a waffle, the joy of starting a new book, a slow glass of red wine, the excitement of lightning, flowers blooming despite the virus, a postcard from far away in the mail, the possibility of winning Powerball and all the people still writing poetry in the middle of a pandemic. I know there’s plenty of woe to go around lately, but don’t we actually need more Wow? I believe it’s still possible for us to pay a visit to that visionary state that artists and children routinely access. When I see my neighbors gathering at the park by my house to marvel at the full moon rising over the water even though it’s millennia-old news by now, I think our Wow! becomes a collective prayer of astonishment, wonder, thanks. A very holy Wow!.

Nikki Hardin is a writer of stories, musings, and memories. Her poetry has been published in Riverteeth Journal. She was the founder and publisher of skirt!, a monthly women’s magazine in Charleston, South Carolina. You can reach her at nikki@thedailynikki.com.