The Nicest Possible Words With Three Consecutive Double Letters

They’re hard to love, but we can do it if we try.

Via Public Domain Review

I say this with more pity than blame, but if you are a word who has somehow managed to accumulate more than two sets of consecutive double letters¹ over the course of your evolution as a lexical unit, it’s a sign that something has gone horribly, horribly wrong. Nonetheless, I believe we should maintain a spirit of empathy and open-mindedness when we look (and try as hard as we can not to ogle or sneer) at words like CREEKKEEPER (someone who looks after fish in a stream, not unlike a BROOKKEEPER), JEEPPOOL (a particularly hip carpool that takes place in a jeep), and SHEEPPOOP (about which, the less said, the better) or—worse somehow—SLEEPPOOPERS (party-poopers for sleep, as, for instance, my children).

History’s most iconic jeeppool

This does not mean that we have to be overly kind about try-hard words like FLOODDOOR, FOOTTOOL, or HEELLOOPS (a kind of FOOTTOOL that’s used in kite-boarding)—we are not, after all, saints—nor can we be expected to conceal our righteous moral outrage about monstrosities like INTERROOMMATE (a type of interaction that happens between roommates) and POSTTEENNESS (the happy state of no-longer being a teenager). 

Via Public Domain Review

But I do think that if we can practice grace and open ourselves to different ways of being in the world, we might begin to see the quiet dignity of a word like CARROOFFUL, which waits patiently to serve in the event of an emergency need to describe the oddly specific quantity derived by the amount of stuff you can fit on a car's roof.

Via Public Domain Review

If we are willing to let the scales fall from our eyes, we might even behold an uncommon beauty in RACCOONNESS (the distinctive air that only our racooniest brethren possess), an enviable swagger in MCCOOLLIKE (the perfect adjective for anyone who shares characteristics with the Irish folk hero Finn McCool), an appealing mystery in ROOMMOOD (how better to distill the vibe in a room?), and a noble industry in the imposing JIBBOOMMAKER (we won’t be sailing anywhere soon if we don't have someone to make the jib booms!). If we can summon the charity to allow SWEETTOOTHED its eye-watering EETTOO torso, then who are we to question YELLOWWOODDOM's borderline graphic WWOODD (or the yellowwood tree its very capacity to be)?

I like to think that once we have graciously allowed these weird (but in their own way, a little bit wonderful) triple-doubled-letter words into our lives, we can begin to appreciate the majesty of the quadruple-double-letterers—our previous disdain for FOOTTOOL giving way to admiration for the astonishing FOOTTOOLLESS; our grudging respect for ROOMMOOD transforming into veneration for the uncompromising COUNTERROOMMOOD (sometimes you need to reverse the vibe in a room).

Via Wikimedia

And once we have seen the light, rather than turning our backs on the GOODDEEDDOM that opened our eyes in the first place, we will finally be ready to appreciate the blinding resplendence of a word that describes one of our most honorable professions—the chosen occupation of the men and women who look after the little corners that our primate cousins call home—a word that encapsulates the essential, life-affirming, awe-inspiring work of the BABBOONNOOKKEEPERS. I hear there are some good ones in WOOLLOOMMOOLLOO.²

Via Public Domain Review

1. With special thanks to this lovely collection of words with doubled letters from Wordways.

2. It’s an early, alternative spelling of the town, but still.