fruition

Completion, realization, fulfillment, final result, end result, culmination, achievement - we hear all of these words on a daily basis, but poor little fruition sits there wasting away, attempting every day to find itself in the Lexis/Nexis search.

Why is fruition the better choice in most cases? Because it comes from the root of all existence: To bear fruit.

When is the pear tree's job done? When it gets a better root structure? When it blossoms? When it grows new branches or greener leaves. No: When it makes a pear. (Feel free to apply this metaphor to your life. See kids.)

Should you ever wonder just how strong this desire for life to replicate itself is, do two things. First, find a clump of grass or a plant growing in a sidewalk. Second, look on here at how many nodes have sex as the topic.

True it is an under-used word which has fallen out of common parlance, but I was someone who championed the cause of this small evocative word, until I was forced to work with a man who believed the word to in fact be FRUITITION.

Being as he was my boss and held the power to fire me for obstinance, it took a year and a half of sniggering behind his back at this, and his many other malapropisms before confronting his ignorance. By this time it had become a long-running joke within the company and we would work the word FRUITITION into conversation as often as possible, bored as we were with our jobs and intent on insubordination.

Ah, small minds; small pleasures. This is what causes me to stumble over the word fruition.

Fru*i"tion (?), n. [OF. fruition, L. fruitio, enjoyment, fr. L. frui, p. p. fruitus, to use or enjoy. See Fruit, n.]

Use or possession of anything, especially such as is accompanied with pleasure or satisfaction; pleasure derived from possession or use. "Capacity of fruition." Rogers. "Godlike fruition." Milton.

Where I may have fruition of her love. Shak.

© Webster 1913.