There is a book by robert von from eighteen. Fifty seven called hours with the mystics where he talks about the holy monasteries of mount athas in greece and he talks about these mystics with their chins on their chest scenting their minds on their hearts searching for an inward divine glory for days on end and he uses the phrase navel contemplating but also uses the phrase gazing at their navels. So it's possible that if people read that that was the origin and after some switcheroo of navel-gazing. But that's the mid eighteen hundreds that you're talking about yeah this idea of Assuming certain position to try to get yourself into mystical trance. I mean i mean it really goes back to hebrew scripture and and The book of kings where elijah puts his head between his knees to pray that's outstanding. Eleanor has an inquisitive mind. Tell us about your life. And the words you've come across and the things that you want to discover and share with us eight seven seven nine two nine nine six three email words at wayward radio dot org more about what we say and why we say it stick around for more of a way with words support for a way with words comes from jack and caroline raymond proud sponsors of wavered inc. The nonprofit that produces distributes this program. You're listening to a way with words. The show about language and how we use it. I'm grant barrett and martha barnett in nineteen seventy-one. A new public library opened in troy michigan to celebrate the children's librarian. A woman named margarita. Hart wrote to famous authors and artists and musicians and others asking them to write to the children of troy both to congratulate them on this milestone and to extol the benefits of their new library. One of the responses she received was from e b white the author of charlotte's web and stuart little and i wanted to share that with you. Dear children troy. You're librarian has asked me to write telling you what a library can mean to you..