Caulking — A Vocabulary Story
The Whistling Window
Every time the wind blew, the window in Jing's bedroom whistled. Not a nice whistle, like a happy postman. A wobbling, warbling whistle, like a walrus attempting opera.
"It kept me up all night," Jing announced at breakfast, with the darkest frown a seven-year-old can manage. "It did a solo at midnight."
Her dad sipped his tea. "There's a gap round the frame. The old caulking has cracked and crumbled away. We'll sort it this morning."
Caulking means a soft or waterproof material used to seal joints or gaps, or the act of filling seams or gaps to make them watertight. As a verb, it means to seal a gap or joint to stop leaks.
In the shed, Dad found the caulking gun, which disappointingly fired no pellets and made no bangs. It just squeezed out a smooth white line of sealant, like toothpaste for houses.
"Can I do a bit?" Jing begged.
"Slow and steady," said Dad. "Like icing a very serious cake."
Jing squeezed. A gigantic white worm splurged onto the windowsill.
"That," said Dad, wiping it up, "was neither slow nor steady."
Her second try was better. Her third was brilliant — a neat, even line filling the gap all round the frame. Dad smoothed it with his finger and stood back like an artist admiring a masterpiece.
"Fresh caulking," he said. "No gap, no draught, no midnight opera."
That night, the wind hurled itself at the house. It rattled the gate. It shook the trees. But Jing's window stayed absolutely, wonderfully silent.
Jing snuggled deeper under her duvet and grinned into the dark.
"Better luck next time, walrus," she whispered, and fell fast asleep.
Word Definition
caulking
meaning
a soft or waterproof material used to seal joints or gaps; the act of filling seams or gaps to make them watertight; to seal a gap or joint to stop leaks
synonyms
sealant · filler · sealing · packing
antonyms
gap · crack · opening
example sentence
Dad squeezed caulking around the edge of the bath.