CroZ

Random word use question.

Is it okay to use 'cradled' to imply 'sitting next to'. As in a lone person sitting beside something (if it's previously established she's alone):

Cradled beside the pond, she...
.etc.

What picture would you get from this?

Necromortis

No. Cradled implies someone holding another person or an object tenderly. You can cradle a girlfriend on your lap, or you can cradle the guitar in your hands, but you can't cradle beside a pond.

Cradle is a verb and it involves another person or an additional object.

~Christian

Mike C

Yup. Cradled implies held within. If she fell in the pond (and floated) you could say she was cradled by the water.

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CroZ

Cheers.

I did find an intransitive verb form indicating to sit or lie as though in a cradle, which seems like what I was going for. But it's obsolete.

seigfried007

Nah, CroZ, use it again. Maybe it'll come en vogue again

I'd go with Mike on this though--unless the bench she's sitting on is awfully neat looking, or she's cradled in the arms of a tree.

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